The Shadow of Ice
by lazerbear7
Summary: An assassin bearing the mark of The Outsider tires of just being a blade for hire and decides a change of profession is in order. Little does he know what will happen when he becomes the bodyguard to a certain royal family. Little bit of swearing, Little bit of violence, if anything else pops up I'll add it to the list.
1. Chapter 1

Nathan Rowland paced around in the stingy smoky bar room nervously. He had been traveling to Arendelle for weeks in anticipation of the huge winter party that the royal family would be holding tomorrow. He was an assassin by trade and had been for several years, but found himself wanting something more. He didn't want to just fight for the highest bidder, he wanted something better. Something more noble. And then he had heard a story of a queen far away who had power over ice. Most people just dismissed it as some kind of drug induced hallucination, but he had seen stranger things than a Queen of ice. He ran a hand through his messy black hair and ordered another drink.

He normally avoided alcohol but he felt like he had to calm his nerves. It was strange how different he felt from when he was on a job. When he was off hunting for a person he was fine. He was calm. But now he didn't have any specific goal. He hoped he would be able to… he didn't know what he wanted to do. The whole thing was insane. He had no idea what he was doing. He set his drink down and paid for a room.

The room was incredibly bland. It was fashioned with some very generic looking wooden furniture but the bed looked soft and inviting, and a far sight warmer than the ones he had slept in recently. He removed his belt which held both his razor sharp sword in a dark leather sheath on his left side, and held a small compact crossbow on his right. He pulled off more bags and pockets full of things other people wouldn't touch with a ten foot barge pole. As he pulled of the final layer of leather vests and hardened weaves of fabrics he felt a sense of drowsiness overtake him in spite of the tight ball of anxiety coiled in his stomach.

He lay down on the bed, rest his head on the feather pillow and watched the shadows of the room climb the walls and ceiling until all the lights were snuffed out and his mind surrendered to the peaceful shelter of sleep.

Than he stood up. He found himself fully equipped again and felt dazed and confused. He had taken his gear off. He remembered it. Than he realized where he was. He sighed and opened the door to his room and saw… nothing. Just the blue, empty, Void. Just what he expected. Buildings shot from the depths of this nothingness and formed what appeared to be a small town, there was a few residential looking buildings, several shops, and a bridge leading nowhere at the end. He disregarded the lack of and ground and stepped off the floor of his room and, sure enough, a cobbled stone path shot up and met his foot as if it had been waiting for him. He strode towards the bridge at the end of the small town; the cobblestone path he walked on dropped back down into nothing seconds after his feet left them as if waiting to be used again. He did not do this for any specific reason, other than that he felt he had seen this bridge before. He couldn't place it but he was sure that he had seen it recently. As he climbed the few steps and got onto the flat plane meant for traffic a large wall spring up from the Void, accompanied by large ornate gates. He recognized the gates as the gates to the castle of Arendelle.

Just then the gates opened and revealed another wide expanse of nothingness. He stepped to the ledge and peered over the perfect ninety degree drop off looking for anything else. He saw nothing and rose his head again and found himself face to face with the outsider. If this had happened a few years ago than perhaps he would have surprised by this sudden appearance, but it was now to be expected with every visit to the Void.

The body that the outsider appeared in was often a thing of debate among those who have seen him. The outsider often appeared as a medium built man with a very pale skin and short black hair, wearing simple commoner clothes. One thing that was always the same was that it always had deep black eyes. Some people said that if you looked deep into its eyes that you could see the entirety of the Void in those small orbs. The outsider always spoke in a monotone voice with only a mild emphasis on some words. The form that the outsider chose today, Nathan saw, was that form that he had seen so many times in his dreams. He was floating just over the edge and looking at him with the straight-faced neutral expression the Outsider always had with her arms crossed in front of her as if he had been waiting for some time. Nathan didn't bother trying to speak, he knew he couldn't. Not until the Outsider finished her message to him. And sure enough his mouth opened and he started off.

"my, my, my" he said looking down at him "you are interesting, aren't you?" he leaned forward and continued, now staring at Nathan intently. "You had everything. You had a life of luxury ahead of you, and you knew it. You built up the reputation as one of the best assassins that has ever lived." He leaned back, a puzzled expression now on her face "And now you throw all of that away?" He tilted her head to the side slightly "Did you do it because you were tired? Tired of all the pointless killing?" his head tilted the other way "Or did you leave so that you could carve a new bloody swath through some other city's nobles?"

Nathan gritted his teeth. As always the outsider knew exactly how to ask the question he was dreading asking himself. In truth he didn't know what he was doing. He was tired of killing endless strings of nobles, one after another, each as corrupt as the last. He was not tired of killing, no. the hunt was one of the only times that he really felt he was doing what he wanted to do. Nothing could measure up to the feeling of weaving his way through patrols of guards, all to spring from the shadows onto an unsuspecting target. He didn't feel guilty for the things he had done, he felt like a rat in a maze. And he wanted out. He didn't know what he would do here in Arendelle but he wanted something different. He wanted to make a mark, to leave a lasting change somewhere.

The Outsider leaned back looking pleased with himself. He knew he had struck a nerve, but he wasn't done yet. He returned to his neutral look and continued "And then there is this business of the ice queen." He saw Nathans focus flit back to him completely "she is real. Her powers given by yours truly. She always had trouble controlling them, though, but she has come into them quite nicely. But not as well as you have, I think." His message had been delivered, but Nathan still had questions, and he still had answers. He had all the answers. But he would only give him one. He decided to answer the question most burning in him mind at the moment. "You have had years to hone your skills and learn your limits. You accepted your power with reverence towards how you could have carved your future out, but she has only come to peace with her power last summer. She was born with it, never truly appreciating the position I put her in. I've never spoken directly to her as I am with you, but I know that she would have… negative feelings towards me. Until this summer she believed herself cursed, having power but no means to control it. I never meant any harm, but it just makes things so interesting."

Nathans mind was struggling to save every bit of knowledge the Outsider had thrown at him; a queen with ice powers, her difficulty controlling those powers, and something happening over summer to change that. And then there were the subtler things. Had he come into his powers well? Now that he thought about it he supposed he had, possessing a few very useful tricks that made being undetected much easier than it would have been without powers. And this "knowing his limits", he didn't argue, he actually agreed, but did that mean that this queen didn't know her limits? If so than what was her limit? Just how powerful was this woman?

His thoughts were interrupted by the outsider again. "But those problems are to come, for now the party is what you are worried about, so take my advice going in; bring your blade."

Nathans eyes opened slowly, taking in the dark room around him. He didn't know what time it was but he did know the day. It was the day of the party. He put on all of his gear, armor, charms, and hoped he wouldn't stand out too much in a crowd of nobles.


	2. Chapter 2

Nathan saw quickly that his hopes of blending In with a crowd were very, very unlikely. His knee length grey thick leather coat stood out quite a bit in a crowd of noble's blue and red satin clothing. The large gates had not opened yet, so all the guests were standing around on the bridge, and most were looking worriedly at the blade at his side and giving him a wide birth. He found their reactions to his blade amusing, as it was customary in the cities he used to occupy to carry a weapon and display it openly.

And then, finally, the huge gates slid slowly open, revealing a huge courtyard. The stone that would make up the floor of the yard were frozen over with a thick sheet of ice, and two fountains near the center looked like the water spewing out of them had frozen in midair, and in the center of it all was a pale women in a long flowing crystalline dress that reflected sunlight like a gemstone and hair as white as the snow that was falling from the sky. She simply stood there and smiled at all the people who had been waiting outside the gates warmly. The whole scene was like something out of a fairy tale. He was never too fond of fairy tales. They always had forced in moral lessons and ridiculous happy endings.

Maybe he was just a bit bitter after all these years of killing, but he preferred the term "realistic"

The woman raised a hand and addressed the crowd with an elated sounding "Are you ready?" to which the crowd responded with a booming "Yes!" and people started pouring into the courtyard. As Nathan was pushed along into the yard he noticed skating blades forming on people's shoes as their feet hit the ice. He couldn't skate, and it had never interested him, so as soon as he was pushed fully in and his feet came down on the icy floor he stepped with his feet at an angle, snapping the blades off as soon as they formed. He looked again at the woman and wondered if she really had enough power to do all of this by herself. If it was all her, than the outsider hadn't exaggerated, she was massively powerful.

Most people started to skate in a circle around the yard, using it like a giant rink, whereas others walked up and addressed the woman directly, bowing and curtsying in shows of great respect. He, on the other hand, simply stepped to the side and leaned up against the wall by the gate and watched the goings on of the bizarre opening of the party.

As he peered around he saw several guards whispering among themselves and pointing at him and eyeing him suspiciously. He knew it was on account of the blade that still hung at his side, and he wondered amusedly if they would try and confront him about it, or if they would simply continue watching from a distance. He felt restless, he knew something would happen, he just didn't know what. Would it be guards? Or would the queen herself try and kill him? Or maybe it would be some other disaster, but he knew that something just had to go wrong.

After about half an hour of standing and watching the townspeople and nobles mingle he saw several going into a great hall looking building and decided to follow them and get out of the cold. As he walked across the ice several people started giving him strange looks. He wondered what they were so puzzled by, until a sweet sounding voice said "wow, you're really sure-footed."

He stopped and turned, finding himself facing a sweet faced girl with ginger braids down her shoulders. She was clinging to a tall blond man who was wearing a thick grey cloth outfit and had slightly dirty blond hair. Overall it looked like the man was trying to teach her to skate.

"Er… yes, I've a lot of practice."

He didn't know what else to say. He didn't particularly want to have a conversation, but considering he had no idea who this was he didn't want to offend her. He decided to be safe before telling them to go away and ask them who they were.

"And… you would be…" he asked unsurely.

The girl stuck out a gloved hand and said "I'm Anna, Princess of Arendelle."

He took a step back. He hadn't realized the queen had a sister, and he wasn't entirely sure whether or not he should shake her had or bow or what he should do. Apparently his momentary distress showed on his face, because she giggled and said

"It's alright, in pretty lax on the formalities."

She stuck her hand out a little farther, and he shook it. She had a pretty loose grip, which was not what he was expecting of someone in such a high position. Both she and the man looked at him expectantly. He knew that they were waiting for him to give his name, but he really didn't want to.

"I'm… I'm uh…"

Than a miracle happened. The pale women who he assumed to be the queen called out from a small group

"Anna, come here, look at this!"

Nathan breathed a sigh of relief. Then said "Nice to meet you." As he waved and Anna was pulled off into the crowds by her friend to go talk to the queen. But this now presented another problem, in that Anna could tell her sister what he looked like, which would make it much more difficult to blend with a crowd, and he couldn't exactly go blinking himself around in a room full of witnesses.

He resumed his walk into the great hall, now with a lingering eye on the queen and princess to make sure they didn't sneak up on him again. He was able to reach the great building housing the hall without incident. On entering the large building he found that there were even more rooms than he thought there would be and far fewer guards than he expected. On the way to the great hall he counted only six guards, all posted at doorways or other similar chokepoints. While he knew one or two guards did have the ability to stop a crowd of angry townsfolk, their affectivity was severely diminished when even just one very determined person came into the mix.

He found a chair in the great hall near the musicians, who were just beginning to play, and took a seat. If he was going to talk to the queen, he wanted to do it alone, and if he wanted to talk to her alone than he would have to wait until the party was over, and he could already tell that that would be quite some time.

But with all this time, he had time to think about what he would say.

First he needed to figure out what he wanted to do here. He had been an assassin almost all his life, but he doubted that this happy little kingdom needed a royal assassin, so he needed to find something else that a life of killing people would lend itself to.

He found his options severely limited.

The things he came up with were either some kind of guard captain or personal bodyguard. Given that he had no interest in commanding other people he found that a personal bodyguard was the best that he could do. He hoped with every cell in his body that she didn't already have one.

All this waiting was agony, he wasn't sure how long he had been sitting but every minute seemed to claw and tear itself into an hour in his mind. Eventually he looked up and saw the queen and Anna coming in the large doors as everyone stopped dancing, playing, and talking to turn and applaud the two royals.

He tried not to look directly at them, as he didn't want Anna to recognize his face, so he instead looked out the windows on the celling. Night had already fallen in that sneaky way it did in winter, and wind howled outside, he hadn't noticed, but all the people who had been skating outside had come in shivering at some point. The two royals strode over to two large thrones and stood in front of them as a pudgy looking caller announced their names.

"Princess Anna and Queen Elsa"

Elsa. He turned the name over in his mind a few times and realized that he hadn't even known her name up until this point. He looked at her as she addressed the crowd about how glad she was that they had all come, and that she was sorry about the weather, but his focus quickly shifted as he heard the familiar sound of a blade being pulled from a sheath.

His eyes darted around the room, searching for the one who had pulled a sword. He found not one, but three men standing in a group close together, two with blades drawn and one with a crossbow. They were looking right at Queen Elsa. He stood up, drew his sword, and started walking towards Elsa. He was closer, so he had an advantage there, but they had a guy with a crossbow, so he had to be fast.

The man with the crossbow took aim, and he knew he didn't have much time. He had no other choice. there was no way he could get between them in time.

He focused, and time stopped. He looked around at the frozen faces and smiled. Now it was clear. Now he knew what he had to do. Now he had purpose. Save the Queen.

He focused on a spot about three feet in front of the queen and let a burst of power go, and he was there. He had just traveled about half the length of the room in less than an instant. But he didn't have time to savor the shocked gasps that came from all around the hall, as the attackers yelled and charged. Something very, very heavy drove into his shoulder, and he felt it punch its way through his padding and armor. Nathan kicked himself mentally for even letting the man get a single shot off, than his friends were on him.

The first man to approach rose his blade above his head, obviously intending to finish Nathan quickly, and pulled it downwards with all his might. The hit would have certainly killed Nathan, if it hit. Se he ducked down and to the man's left side, narrowly avoiding the blade as it came crashing down. He then punched forwards with his own blade, and it slid in-between the man's ribs with ease. He pulled it back out and turned to the next man. He was on the floor of the hall, whereas Nathan was on the slightly elevated area which held the throne. It wasn't much, but maybe…

He leaped off the top stair and angled his blade down with his wrist. The man he was jumping at suddenly stopped sprinting at him and tried to run the opposite direction, but just ended up slipping and falling flat on his back. Nathan came down on top of him, jamming his blade point first into the eye socket of the man, who twitched and gurgled, then lay still.

Before he even looked up he prepared another blink. Time, as well as the screaming, gasping, and a good bit of crying, stopped. There was one more man, the one who had shot him, and he intended to repay him for the bolt. Nathan looked up and saw the man about halfway across the room, one arm around Anna' s throat, the other pressing his crossbow up against the lower part of her skull. If he shot that crossbow there would be no chance of Anna surviving.

He was just in range of another blink, but it would put him right in front of the man, which would likely give him plenty of time to kill Anna and Nathan couldn't take that chance. He looked around at the faces frozen in fear and puzzlement, hoping for some kind of answer from those people who were suspended in time. Needless to say, they offered no advice…

But they may offer him something else. He looked around now, not at the faces, but at the composition of the crowd now, at the structure of the groups. He looked for any opening that would shield him from the eyes of the man holding Anna. He saw a perfect opening, an enormously fat man in the clothes of a rich business man who was cowering at what was happening, would make the perfect shield. He focused there and let another surge of power loose, and he was there, ducking behind the huge man like a child behind a parent's leg. The sounds, the cries, the pleas, and the screams all washed over them again and he almost felt as if he drew power from them. He gained confidence from the fact that people still feared him, it made him feel that he was powerful. But he had spent far too long here, it was less than a second, but still far too much. He focused energy again, and again the sounds stopped. He leaned out from behind the fat man and looked at the man holding Anna. Now he would be able to get at the side he was holding the crossbow with. He smiled even wider than he had before. Now he had him.

Nathan put another surge of power as he focused on the man's side, and was there. The man hadn't seen him yet, but was just starting to glance around, a terrified look in his eyes. Nathan had no intention of letting the man see him and prepare, so he lunged forwards with his left hand and pulled the crossbow away from Anna's head and with the right hand brought his blade in an upwards slash, severing the man's hand from the rest of his arm. As all this happened, the man's grip on Anna loosened and she was able to pull herself free. She took off towards her sister as soon as the man's had came off and the crossbow hit the floor. Nathan knew the man would likely have a weapon to use with his other hand, and he wasn't going to give his the opportunity to use it. He spun his blade, ensuring that he had a solid grip on the handle, and brought it down with as much force as he could on the man's neck. The blade smoothly sang through even the bone of the neck, and exited the other side almost as if there had been nothing in the way to begin with.

The severed head hit the floor with a wet thud. Nathans smile faded. Everyone was looking at his with genuine fear in their eyes. Everyone except for Queen Elsa, who was looking at him with a shocked expression. It was clear that she had at least some understanding of what had just happened. As Nathan looked at her he saw a small spattering of blood, sharp crimson, against the snow white of her face. This puzzled him. He hadn't killed anyone in such a way that blood would get on her, and the only time he had been close enough to get any on her anyways was…

He looked at his shoulder. The butt of the bolt stuck out stubbornly from his many layers of cloth and armor, as if to remind him that despite all of his skill and power, he always could slip up. But he hadn't seen any other choice. No, he wouldn't let this wound bother him. He had to have made the right choice, he had only had one choice, other than let the Queen die, and he couldn't allow that.

Some woman screamed. This brought Nathans attention back to the situation at hand. He looked around and noticed that people were beginning to surround him, it was a loose circle, but a circle none the less. He knew that he had to leave, else he would be caught and ensnared by what few castle guards there were. He looked back at the Queen longingly, than noticed a door on the wall to her left.

A brilliant idea popped into his mind. He focused his energy and time stopped, than focused right in front of Queen Elsa, and gave a surge of power. She gasped, but he put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her close, and whispered in her ear

"I would like a word in private."

Than focused his energy again, this time his focus on the door, and let another surge. He appeared in front of the door, threw it open, and closed it quietly behind him, praying to the outsider that no one had seen him.

Nathan let out a sigh and looked around the small hallway as he walked quickly down it. It carried on to a small side entrance to the main hallway that led into the great hall. From the exit to the small side hall he was in he could see out into the courtyard, and to the gates. He saw many more guards than he had the first time through. He knew that he would be unable to get to the gates and get through without being seen, but maybe he didn't have to leave the castle at all.

He looked at the other side of the hallway and saw a set of large spiral stairs, and considered his options. On one hand, he was likely to be found it he spent all night in this castle, as he expected a thorough sweep of the grounds and everything inside, but on the other hand he couldn't go back into the town after he had shown his face to everyone. He weighed one against another, and found he liked his odds against the castle guard much more than against the whole town. So he decided to stay in the castle until he had the opportunity to slip away. Or talk to Elsa. Whichever came first. He blinked to the foot of the stairs and started creeping his way up. Luckily it seemed that the majority of the staff was posted to take care of the partygoers, leaving the upper levels of the castle unattended. He climbed to the top floor, the third, and opened the first door he saw. It looked like a small study, with rows of books lining the walls, and a large plush looking sofa sitting in front of a fireplace, unfortunaly without and fire burning in the hearth. There was also a large desk in the corner in front of a window overlooking the courtyard. This was both good and bad, good because this would let him see what was going on in the yard, guard patrols, people leaving, but bad because he wouldn't be able to light any fire or candle or he would attract attention to his little room.

The fatigue hit him like a sack of bricks. His eyelids started drooping and his limbs felt heavy. He felt so tired because of how tense and on-edge all day. And now he felt stangely calm. He felt like he needed sleep.

He took a chair from the large writing desk and propped it up against the door to keep it from opening from the other side. He doubted that if someone tried to open this door that it would keep them out for long, but it should give him time to get away. He looked the room over one last time, satisfied with his few changes, and lay down on the sofa. He was very happy that it was even softer than it looked. He put his hands behind his head, kicked his feet up on the opposite armrest, closed his eyes, and told himself

"Just a few minutes."

And everything faded to black.


	3. Chapter 3

Nathan awoke to the sound of something large slamming against something larger that didn't want to move. He opened one eye and peered around, seeing the study as he had left it. Than he shot up and looked at the chair he had left keeping the door shut. It had fallen over, probably after that last hit, and no wonder either, it had sounded like whoever was trying to open it was using a battering ram. Than a horrible thought popped into his mind. He sprung up from the sofa and walked quickly to the door, placing an eye to the keyhole. What he saw was horrifyingly accurate to what he had thought two burly guards, carrying an oversized plank of wood with thick metal bindings and handles that probably weighed as much as both of them combined, and a small scrawny guard, shouting orders to the two men.  
"Hit it again!"  
The two men rolled their eyes and pulled the ram back with a grunt. Nathan jumped back from the door. He could hardly believe that these guards were actually going to beat the door down. He would've found the whole situation much funnier if he were not on the other side of the door that was about to be destroyed. He summoned the energy that would prepare his blink spell, but waited to focus it until the door was down, and he had somewhere to go.

The men on the other side grunted once again, and a moment later the door, for lack of a better word, exploded off its hinges, sending splinters and shards of metal framing everywhere. The majority of the door stayed in one piece, falling to the floor with a solid thud, and the many shards fell to the floor and bounced, sounding almost like rain on the wooden floor.

As soon as the door hit the floor he focused his energy, and the shards, the door, and the men behind it, froze. He looked at the guards and cursed as he noticed that the small one who seemed to be in charge was looking directly at him. The man obviously hadn't completely processed that he was there, which was good, because it meant that he would likely just dismiss ever seeing Nathan as him just imagining things. The other two men had their eyes closed, Nathan assumed to shield them from splinters, so he didn't even have to worry about them.

He shifted his focus to the hall behind the small man, pulsed energy, and was there. Than he ducked down and started to creep away, taking wide, slow steps. He quickly came to the spiral stairs that he had used to get up to this level of the castle and made his way down.

On the second floor landing he heard two more guards talking with each other. He stopped moving and listened as closely as he could. He only was able to pick up on about the last part of a conversation.  
"… has been under a lot of stress today."  
"Well who wouldn't be? Someone tried to kill her."  
They were talking about the queen? He got even more interested.  
"I don't think she's taking it well, and how it ended doesn't help."  
"Yea, what happened? From what I hear…" the other guard cut him off  
"I don't wanna talk about it. Ever."  
There was a short pause.  
"Sorry, it's just… I… I'll just go check on the Queen. Courtroom, right?"  
"Yea."

So, the Queen was in the courtrooms. Now he just had to find those, but one guard had said he was going to check on the Queen, so he would just have to follow him. It was wonderful how things like this worked out.

Tailing the guard was easy, with only a few close calls that were born from his lack of knowing what lay around some corners, but that was to be expected with such a large unfamiliar building. At the end of his stalking of this guard who was only doing his job he came to a spacious room with many uncomfortable looking chairs, and an elevated platform at the far end with a large desk and chair, and a small door behind those. In the large elevated chair behind the desk was the Queen, looking very board. She appeared to be in some kind of trade meeting, as there was a small man standing in the large gap between the chairs and the desk, who was discussing the importance of maintaining trade routes and reliable income and other things that would likely bore Nathan to death faster than watching paint dry. He wondered if he could blend into the small number of people if he took a seat and waited, but after his rather spectacular performance last night he would likely be spotted almost instantly.

He looked to the ceiling, hoping for some alternative to waiting outside and dodging guards until this whateveritwas was over, and saw rafters lining the roof. He could get up there easily, but he didn't know how long he would be there, and it would not be a comfortable wait.

He pushed off the ground with his legs, and it was like he was caught in a sudden updraft that blew him about fifteen feet into the air. No one else in the room even noticed the sudden wind, as it was a wind that only seemed to exist for Nathan. He cursed as he ascended, he saw that the wind wouldn't carry him the whole way to the thick wooden bars, but one short blink later and he was seated on top of the bar, where no one would even think to look for him.

As he sat there, he found himself thinking again. He seemed to be doing that a lot recently. He thought about his whole life, the places he had been, the things that he had seen, and all the people he had killed. He didn't regret any of it, that was true, but he just… didn't want to do it anymore. Maybe it was that he didn't even make a mark any more. Every corrupt noble he killed was always replaced with another. There were no good men in rule of cities anymore, not where he was from. So that, he supposed, was his reason for leaving. But why come here? There was certainly a curious part of him that wanted to learn about the "Queen of Ice" as he had heard it in some bar, but that wasn't enough. There had to be something else. What was he missing?

Perhaps it was that the story in the bar had described her as a just and fair ruler, despite her power. Yes, that was it. It had to be. He was of the belief that power corrupted people in a strange way: the more powerful one grows, the weaker one gets. This Queen was very powerful in two respects, commanding both a very influential kingdom and having power over ice and cold. And yet there were people who believed her to be as pure as… well, as pure as the snow she could create. There was some sense to that, he supposed, but it was unlikely. Every noble went bad. It was always just a matter of time. But if that was the case, than why had he come? if he knew she was just as bad as the rest than there was no point in coming, and he would just be another blade for hire. But there was something else. Something deep down that he hadn't felt for a long time. Hope. A naïve, childish hope. But hope none the less.

Was she different? Could she be? He hadn't seen any signs that would indicate she was, in fact, a horrible monster ruler. In fact, the city at the shore of the castle and the surrounding countryside seemed at peace. As if the entire kingdom knew it was safe in Queen Elsa's care. Ut it was obvious that Elsa was not safe in the kingdom's arms, that much was obvious. If he hadn't been there last night than those men would have killed her.

If she was as good as everyone said she was, than he couldn't just let her die. He would not allow someone as undeserving of death just be stuck on some two-bit assassins blade for some noble far away who wanted to tear this kingdom down and suck the ruined ashes dry.

No

That was why he was here. He wanted to first see if she was as pure as her reputation, and if so, to protect her with every breath he drew. If she really was pure than he would be glad to dedicate his life to someone else. Perhaps it had something to do with him knowing that he was so impure, or maybe it was that he wanted to redeem himself, but whatever it was, Nathan knew the outsider was listening to his thoughts with a wicked smile on his face.

He refocused his thoughts. All this introspection and jumping ahead of himself was making him uncomfortable, and a bit pathetic. There wasn't much else to focus on, though, as he quickly found out. So he shifted focus to the incredibly boring business going on below. As far as he could tell it was some convoluted trade agreement between Arendelle and some place he had never heard of called "Weaseltown". From what he heard, trade between the two had been cut off quite suddenly, and Weaseltown was scrabbling to get it back, whereas Arendelle was in no hurry to get goods flowing again. The man present to represent Weaseltown was a short man in the garb of a military leader. His body size had to be one of the strangest that Nathan had ever seen, it was as if he had simply stopped growing at some point before he had turned ten, because he had a regular sized head, and a body that was about half as big as it needed to be. The Queen looked at his with a certain kind of difficult to place disdain, as if he had wronged her before and she was trying to look past what happened before.

Eventually, there was some conclusion reached. Nathan didn't know what it was, as somewhere along the line all the business and negotiations just blended into one big background noise, but the Queen stood up and announced that the negotiations had finished. Everyone in the room stood and stretched their legs. Then the Queen opened the door behind her great desk, and Nathan knew that he had to act.

As quickly as he could he dropped from the rafters and focused. Everything, including him in midair, froze. Next he focused on the small bit of floor inside the room the queen was entering. Than he pulsed his power and focused again, now on the floor inside, just behind the queen. Everything resumed for half an instant before he was able to freeze it all again, and he looked around.

It was a small room, likely meant for the queen to take short breaks in-between hearings in. as such there wasn't much furniture. It was sparsely furnished with mostly just bare wall and wooden floor space, but there was another desk, smaller than the one outside the door, and a large comfortable looking chair. All in all not too many places to hide. He at least wanted the door to be closed before he started talking to the queen. From his position behind her he could probably get between her and the door without much trouble, but that would give a rather aggressive feel, which he did not want to give her.

Nathan decided that under the desk would be the best spot. The desk was low enough and the room small enough that you could not see under it while standing unless you looked in from the courtroom. He pulsed his power and pulled himself into the shadows under the desk. The Queen closed the door and let out an annoyed sigh, then walked the chair, sat down, and closed her eyes. Now would be as good of a time as he was likely to get, Nathan figured, so he silently exited from underneath the table and stood in the middle of the room facing the queen. He was unsure of how he should address her, or if he should just wait until she opened her eyes.

Before he could decide which to do, his mouth seemed to come to a decision of its own. Without even thinking he cleared his throat. Elsa looked up, startled, and when she saw Nathan she shot to her feet and got into something resembling a fighting stance. And then they just stood there. Staring at each other.

Nathan cleared his throat again, and started speaking.

"Um… hello. I'm… I'm sure you remember me."

Wow. That was the best he had? Well he may as well just exit the room with his head bowed in shame for how well this was going. But her hands lowered slightly, it was almost imperceptible, but he saw it. Despite the pathetic start to his proposal he might still be able to pull this off. No matter how painful or awkward this got, he had to keep pushing forward.

"So, I would like to… to make a proposition to you."

Elsa lifted an eyebrow and looked a bit confused.

"I was… do you…"

He had to stop this fumbling. He drew a deep breath and felt his nerves calm.

"I was wondering if you needed a…" he stopped and thought for a moment, than continued "royal protector" he said hesitantly.

She just looked at him with a confused frown on her face. Maybe he needed to clarify what he meant.

"I would like to take on the job of protecting you."

There. Plain and simple. Hopefully that wouldn't offend her, as he wasn't actually addressing her with the proper respect that she was probably used to. She just looked more confused than anything, though. She pointed to the door, than at him, than at the floor, muttering to herself, than asked

"How did you get in here?"

"Uh…" Nathan faltered again. That was one of the things he had wanted to avoid talking about until an answer had been given as to whether he was accepted or not. He knew that she had seen him blinking around the ballroom, but she likely didn't know what else he could do, or the limits of what she had seen. He could just say he teleported into this room from the outside, but that would be a huge exaggeration of his powers. Truth was he could only blink to something he could see, and not through solid objects. The range on the blink was also limited, but it always seemed to be far enough. He had a few other powers too, but there had been no reason to use them yet.

He realized how long he had been thinking and Elsa had the look about her of "about to call the guards" so he decided truth would be best. "I snuck in" he said, a bit proud of himself, "past all the guards. After all the… excitement last night I doubt that they would just let me waltz in."

She tilted her head for a moment, as if trying to figure out if that made sense, then said suspiciously "And why should I trust you?"

Nathan was ready for this one, quickly saying "Well, I did save you" he emphasized the next word "and you're sister." He hoped that that would be enough to convince her that he didn't want to hurt her.

Elsa's hands fell back to her side in a tired sort of way, and she sighed as if she was giving up in an argument she couldn't win. She fell back into the chair and put her face into her hands.

"I'll talk to my sister about it."

Her voice was muffled and she sounded tired. Nathan wasn't sure if he should try and comfort her or just take that small victory and run with it.

He walked over in front of the large chair and knelt down on one knee and said "are you… alright? Is there anything I can do?"

Elsa looked up from her hands and Nathan thought he saw tears in the corners of her eyes. Her mouth quivered for a moment, as if she were trying to speak, and she threw her arms around Nathan, who stood as soon as this happened and started trying to pry her arms off of his neck. It didn't take much effort, but as soon as he did he saw her eyes again. There were tears flowing freely now, and she was shuddering, still trying to speak.

"I… I j-just... I d-don't know w-what t-to do."

Nathan pushed her arms back to her side and sat her back down in the chair. He couldn't help but think about how bizarre this little proposition turned out. He appeared to offer his service and ended up consoling. He had to assume that this distress was brought on by the attempt on her life. The guards had said about as much, and there wasn't much else he could imagine that would shake her up this much.

He put a hand against her cheek and said "Hey, hey, it's alright."

He was very uncomfortable. He was not used to this kind of interaction with people, so he had to get her out of this fragile state.

"it's ok, its ok, just…" he paused, thinking, and finished "focus."

Elsa's crying stopped and she focused on him. She took a deep breath and composed herself. She stood again, Nathan did the same, and walked to the center of the room.

"How can you help?"

Nathan turned to her and rose an eyebrow.

She said again, taking a step towards him

"How can you help? What can you do to stop those who would harm me?"

Nathan smiled confidently. "Finding people is… something of a talent of mine. And stopping them even more so."

She hesitated for a moment, then said

"Ok… I… I believe you."

Nathan clapped his hands together, saying "good. I expect you still have the bodies?" and Elsa nodded. "Well, let's go pay a visit." He pointed a thumb over his shoulder towards the exit to the small room and offered his other hand to Elsa, who took it and allowed herself to be guided out of the room, but dropped it when she reentered the courtrooms.

Then she started to walk in front of him and lead the way, and he had to assume that she was leading him to the place they stored the bodies. Every castle had a morgue, they had to. Every castle Nathan had ever been in had had one. At least to his knowledge. They had to. Wasn't it a requirement of some kind? It had to be.

As they walked through the halls, Nathan noticed a few things; the first of which was that she was incredibly informal with her guards most of the time, often just waving them off when they inevitably reacted negatively to seeing him, the man they had seen murder three people within the span of time less than two seconds. To be fair though, they had every reason to be concerned about the Queen being right next to probably the most dangerous man in this kingdom, even if they knew he was or not. The second thing that he noticed was that the bolt from the man's crossbow from last night was still lodged in his shoulder. The fact it didn't hurt and had not restricted his movement at all told him that the injury was not too bad, but the fact that there was not much of the bolt visible told him that it may be more dangerous than he thought. Of course it was entirely possible that the man had just been using a short bolt, as it would be easier to hide and get into a party, but he had just strode in with a blade practically on display and had got nothing more than worried looks. He gave the bolt a few experimental tugs and felt nothing more than mild discomfort. No grinding on bone and no barbs dig into his flesh. In fact, it seemed to just slide out of what turned out to be a shallow wound easily.

Now he was left with a bloody bolt in his hands as he followed the Queen which caused even more strange looks from guards. Than it came to his attention that the wound was bleeding. It was a light bleed, but enough that it would draw attention to the fact he was hit, which he didn't want. He doubted that any blood would bleed through his thick many layered armor, but it wouldn't be the first time that something like that had happened. He rooted through his many pockets for something he could just shove in the hole and not worry about until he had the time to bandage it properly. After several seconds of looking he found some odd looking tattered white rag that looked clean enough and just shoved it in the small hole in his gear. If he were giving care to someone else he would never do something like that, but he knew that he was highly resilient to disease and infection, so he knew he was safe.

As he was pushing the cloth in with a single gloved finger he saw out of the corner of his eye that Elsa was eyeing what he was doing with a concerned look on her face. She looked from his wound to his face, a worried look in her eyes, and stopped walking. She asked, with as far as Nathan could tell, real worried in her voice, which was more than he was expecting. Typically royals didn't care too much about new recruits. Perhaps she was different after all.

"Are you ok? Do you need…"she paused as if unsure what to offer him "a doctor, an-and medicine."

This made him chuckle. He tried to hide it but failed. It seemed strange to him that she was so worried, he had taken much worse before. But she didn't know that. He had to keep reminding himself that he had left his reputation behind along with all the fear he used to be regarded with. He smiled at her reassuringly and put a hand on her shoulder, saying "I've been hit worse than this, trust me."

She flinched slightly when he touched her shoulder, but didn't pull away, which Nathan appreciated. He took his hand off and swept it wide across the hall they had been walking down and said "Shall we continue?"

Elsa laughed tensely, and said "We're almost there. Just a few more turns." She was uncomfortable. Nathan could tell. He supposed that he would be too, if the roles were reversed. It's a strange feeling, knowing that someone somewhere wants you dead. A feeling he knew well.

At last they came to a small set of double doors that looked like they weren't used much. Elsa gestured to the doors, saying "Here we are." and Nathan shouldered the surprisingly heavy doors open. As the doors creaked open Nathan and Elsa were both hit with the sudden smell of blood. Elsa stayed by the doors, gaging slightly, and Nathan strode towards the corpses laying on small wooden tables in the center of the spacious room. It was surprisingly big, for a morgue, but ceiling was very low in comparison to the rest of the building that he had seen, with only room for about half his height in between his head and the ceiling.

Nathan turned his attention to the corpses. Elsa approached as he started to root through the men's pockets, looking for anything that would give him a hint as to why they had attacked Elsa. Looting the first man, the one he had stabbed in the ribs, yielded nothing but a few dirty coins and a few torn up playing cards.

Elsa was looking over Nathan's shoulder as he started on the next man, the one who had gotten Nathan's blade in his eye, and asked "what are you looking for exactly?"

Nathan smiled as he pulled a small pouch off of the corpse's belt and rifled through it, saying "it's to see if I can figure out why they tried to kill you."

Elsa nodded, than asked "And if you don't find anything?"

Nathan's smile faded slightly. "Then I go to the city and see if I can find anything there. Although If I can't than it probably means that they were working on their own."

Elsa nodded again as Nathan pulled a crumpled piece of paper out of a shirt pocket and straightened it out. As he looked it over, his eyes widened slightly and his focused more on the paper. As he finished reading he folded the paper and placed it in a pocket. Elsa opened her mouth, about to ask what it said, but Nathan interrupted her saying "It was a bar tab."

Elsa looked confused, asking "And how is that useful?"

Nathan said "it had a few names on it." In a strangely neutral tone. Elsa didn't know what it meant, but Nathan did. He was slipping into the mindset he always went into when he was on a job. When he did this he got cold and distant, and it was when he was most comfortable.

The tab had the name of a bar at the top, and a few names with sizeable amounts of money, but that wasn't enough. He needed more. He moved to the last body. The man that he had decapitated lay on the wooden table still very much dead.

Rooting through his pockets seemed to be a lost cause, as he didn't even appear to have any pockets. But nevertheless Nathan gave the dead body a pat-down and only felt extremely awkward doing this in front of Elsa. Out of the corner of his eye he could see her averting her gaze to an empty corner of the room, and he felt incredibly thankful.

Luckily, however, he did find something. A hidden pouch on the man's lower back. He pulled at it and a weak thin leather strap keeping it in place snapped. He pulled the pouch open and withdrew a carefully folded piece of paper. He unfolded it and read aloud to Elsa

"Dear Mr. Hassan,  
you and your friends have been paid in advance as per our agreement of one hundred each. I expect the job to be done exactly to my specifications. Once complete, the remainder of your pay will be waiting at the pre-determined dead-drop.  
Your employer,  
Sir FishFace."  
Nathan rose an eyebrow and turned to Elsa  
"Sir FishFace?" he asked in an incredulous tone.

Elsa couldn't help but to laugh at his reaction. She couldn't blame him though, as the name was quite bizarre. Nathan folded the paper and placed it in a pocket. Than he addressed Elsa, saying "Alright, I think I have enough."

Now it was Elsa's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Really? Is that enough to find someone?"

The corners of Nathan's mouth curled into a predatory smile, and he said "I told you, special talent, remember?"


	4. Chapter 4

Elsa suddenly found herself wondering if trusting this person was a good idea. After all, she hadn't even gotten a name from him. He had simply showed up and offered to help. What was she supposed to do but accept?

So she had provided him with a document that indicated that whatever he did tonight, he did on royal business. In hindsight that seemed a fairly poor decision, but if he were to be caught fighting by city guards they would certainly detain him and that would, as he put it "Let the leads go cold"

She had also given him a bag of one hundred coin. Not a huge amount, but to the right people it was a small fortune. He had requested it specifically, and when Elsa had asked him what good it would do him he had said "Sometimes money speaks better than even the most eloquent person." and she found herself agreeing.

And now she was watching him walk out towards the front gates, with a bag of her money, and a seal of her approval.

Yes. This had to have been a truly horrible idea. She had half a mind to call down to the guards to shut the gates and retrieve the things she had given him. But he was the only one thus far to offer any real help, all the other people had just tried to comfort her and set her at ease instead of actually doing anything to help. He was the first person to even suggest taking any sort of action against those who had attacked her.

She had seen him kill people. He had done it as if it came as a second nature. It was strange, to think that had he not been there than she would not be standing here now. And now she had seen people die. It was a simple fact, but one she wasn't sure she had fully processed. She was no stranger to death of course, being a queen left her dealing with the consequences of people dying all the time, deciding what happened to their estate if they didn't leave a will, sometimes even attending funerals herself if the person who died had been important or close to her. But she had never actually seen anyone die. She had no idea it could be so… fast. One moment those men had been charging at her, intent on her death. And then…

She looked down again and saw the man just exiting the gates. She wondered what his plan was, if he had one, or whether he really intended to help her at all. He had seemed so sincere, though. People couldn't just lie like that, being a Queen she had to deal with a lot of people trying to lie to her, and she had gotten very good at knowing when she was being lied to. He hadn't given any indication of lying, and if he was that good of a liar, Elsa couldn't help but feel he had earned the gold at least.

He was crossing the bridge now, as the sun was setting early as it always did in winter. Soon the night sky would be filled with the thin streamers of the northern lights and the streets would be lit dimly with small flames in the lamp posts that lined the streets. As he reached the main city he turned a corner, and was gone. She sighed, fed up of being anxious and nervous. She turned to the door and strode out of her bedroom, saying to herself

"I need a drink"

Nathan walked quietly through the empty streets. He was wandering in search of the bar called the "Frothy Brew". Once he got there he would ask around about Hassan, the man named in the note from "FishFace". He still had a hard time accepting that that was a name that someone had chosen and thought to be a good name. After he got information on Hassan he would decide his next move. One side of his jacket felt heavy from the hefty bag of gold he had requested, and he had his document from the queen in an inside pocket of his top-layer grey cloth coat.

Close to his bag of money he had his bandoleer of six bone charms. All of them gave off a strange, otherworldly heat. They seemed almost to vibrate with some kind of internal energy that made most people uncomfortable. Each charm had a certain affect. The effects of these charms could vary widely, as he had one which allowed him to walk on slippery surfaces unhindered, and another to fortify his focus so that he didn't tire from using his powers as quickly as he would otherwise. One of the ones he felt would be more useful tonight was the charm that allowed him to walk without leaving footprints, or any other sort of mark on the ground. One of the more minor ones that he preferred to always have was one he bought from a street side vendor a long time ago. It was one of the first he had gotten, now that he thought about it, and it was one the woman had called an "unnerving target" charm. Its effect was fairly humorous, when he was in a good position to make it work. It made anyone trying to hit him with a ranged weapon of any kind simply lose their nerve to make the shot just before they did, generally resulting in a miss by a huge degree. He didn't know how the charm did this to everyone, but it was one of the few he always had with him. His last charm was a slightly more universal use as it allowed a simple drink of water to clear his mind, thus allowing him to use his powers again if he got too unfocused or ran out of energy.

His powers all drew from a kind of central pool of energy. The amount of raw power he was able to draw from this pool was dependent on how focused he was on pulling this power. His small powers, like blink, used a small amount of energy, not enough to really cause any dent in the pool. So as long as he didn't do it rapidly he could blink indefinitely. His larger powers, however, drew quite a bit of power from the central pool. He had one power that would drain almost all his power, but he rarely even had the chance to use it. It allowed him to turn his body, his entire being, into a shadow. It was brief, barely a second, but for that one second he was a shadow. He had only found this power useful for escaping from bonds or for reaching almost anywhere, but it was effective enough to let him slip from any chains or cage. This power had saved his skin several timed before.

The sun fell quickly as he wandered through the streets, looking for the Frothy Brew. Nathan spent at least half an hour looking though empty streets before he finally heard the unmistakable sound of drunk people. Chanting, shouting, and slurred exchanges. He turned a few corners, and found himself bathed in the warm light of the bar he was looking for.

The sign to the Frothy Brew was a large affair. It hung off of a large pole and looked like it was adorned with real frozen fizz from a drink. He couldn't help but be impressed by the effect. He pushed the heavy set door open and stepped inside the seedy bar room, shaking snow off his boots.

Everyone in the bar turned and looked at him. They were the typical people one would expect to see in a seedy place like this. Most of them were big burly men who looked like they worked pretty tough manual labor. All of them, with the exception of the bartender, were turned and glaring at him as if his very presence was an insult.

He walked in and took a seat on a barstool. The bar tender walked over to him and said in a gruff voice "What'll it be?" as the drunks on the other side of the bar returned to their drink.

Nathan pulled out the paper with the tabs on it, saying "how about a little info?"

He placed the paper down on the bar and pointed to the name Hassan "Who would this fellow be?"

The barman picked a glass from behind the bar and a cloth from his belt and started wiping the glass out as he looked at the paper and grunted, then said "Just some guy. Comes 'round here all the time. Why you askin'?"

Nathan picked the paper back up and replaced it in a pocket, saying "He did something stupid. I believe he got paid to do it. I want to know by who and why." He leaned forward and said "Any ideas?"

The barman looked Nathan up and down, snorted, and said "Haven't the foggiest."

Nathan leaned back, stretching his back and said "Look" than leaned back in even closer than before

"he's dead." The barman looked at him, totally unfazed. Nathan pulled the tabs out of the pocket again, looked at it, and gave a low whistle. "Fifty coin? Must've come here often. As I'm sure we both know collecting money from dead men is hard." The barman raised an eyebrow at this, but kept listening. Nathan continued "So I'm sure that you can appreciate this… rare opportunity of someone offering to pay a dead man's debt."

The barman gave an annoyed sigh, then said "I don't know who it was, but they looked rich."

Nathan smiled slightly than said "Any… weird looks? Missing limbs? Horrible scars?"

The barman glared daggers at him and asked "Look, do you got the fifty or not?"

Nathan smiled confidently and pulled the cloth bag from a deep pocket and dropped it onto the table. The clink of coins was unmistakable by even the drunkest of man, as a few in the group who hadn't been laughing, shouting, or chugging looked over at the bag with interest. Nathan ignored them and asked the barman "How about a hundred?"

The barman stopped looking annoyed now, and instead looked very interested. Now it was his turn to lean forward. He smiled politely, saying "Ah, you know how to drive a bargan, boy." As he took the bag and placed it under the bar greedily. "Now, if I had to guess as to who this rich boy was, I'd have to say he reminds me an awful lot of that Pratchett feller'." Nathan gave a questioning look, and the barman clarified "You know, the big ol' hot shot… what do they call 'em?" he paused for a moment "entrepreneurs." He finished looking happy with himself.

Nathan gave the man a big smile. All this information was very useful, but he needed more. He asked "What kind of entrepreneur? What's his business?"

The barman laughed now and said "Ah, new round' here in Arendelle are you? He's been big recently. Got some money somewhere and started himself a boomin' fishing business." He leaned in closer and whispered, pointing at the group of drunks "them's all workers for him down at the docks and on ships. Loading crew, I believe."

Now Nathan was getting to the good stuff. The personal information was what he needed. He was confident that this man, Pratchett, was the one who paid the three would-be assassins, but he needed to know why. What would motivate a successful business man to kill the Queen? He doubted that the barman would know, but there was one more question he had that would lead him to the next step of the investigation. "And where might this Pratchett live, exactly?"

The barman now shuffled uncomfortably. "Why you wantin' to know?"

Nathan could see that he didn't want to tell him this, but he needed to know this. He was about to offer the barman more money, but before he could one of the drunks grabbed his shoulder and pulled him off the stool sending him tumbling to the floor.

The man who threw him was the biggest of the crew and looked to be in charge. He stood above Nathan in a menacing manor, leering at him from dim, sunken looking eyes. He spoke, his voice was deep and slurred heavily with drink. "Whachu wann with da boss, eh?" he turned to the rest of the men "less teach thish guy a lessson!"

The barman spoke up now saying "No, no I won't have you fighting in here. Take it to the streets or I'll beat the lot of ya!"

The leader of the men turned to him now, and said "Gladerly." With what was likely supposed to be a small nod, but ended up looking like he was trying to give himself a concussion. Nathan pulled himself to his feet only to be pushed out the door halfway sending him tumbling into the snow. He gritted his teeth, thinking that if they kept this up than they wouldn't have to worry about their hangovers tomorrow.

The leader followed Nathan out the door and lifted him off the ground by the collar of his jacket. Nathan felt his feet leave the ground and knew he had to break this hold. He whipped his head forwards, smashing his forehead into the bridge of the man's nose, which started gushing blood. The man howled in pain and dropped Nathan. Nathan didn't want to reveal his powers just yet, and he still needed information, so he decided to stay in the thick of things and see if something happened.

He landed nimbly on his feet and saw two more drunks coming towards him arms outstretched. He jumped back as one lunged at him, trying to grab him, but the man simply fell short and hit the street, vomiting as he went. The second man kept up his approach, but slipped in the pool of vomit his friend had spewed and actually went head over heels backwards. The back of his skull hit the cobbled street with a loud thumping sound and he stopped moving. A third man, who had been nursing the leader's nose, drew a small pocketknife and began advancing. Nathan saw the man's grip on the knife was very loose so he simply jumped forwards and grabbed he man's hand, twisting it until he dropped the knife.

Then Nathan heard someone a ways down the street yell "Halt, in the name of the law!" and a man, illuminated by the light of a large lantern in his hand, started running towards them.

Nathan saw his opportunity and focused. The man struggling in his arms, the bloodied leader, the guard running right for them, and even the few snowflakes falling from the sky froze in place. Nathan glanced around quickly but saw no alleyways or places he could be out of sight. Then he looked up. The flat roof of the bar was just within blinking range, and he doubted the drunk in his hold could break free on his own. He pulsed his energy, and threw the man forward. He tripped on a loose tile and tumbled over.

Nathan leapt on him and put a hand over his mouth, whispering "shout and I'll cut your throat out." The drunk struggled for a moment than seemed to process what Nathan had just said, stopping his thrashing and looking at Nathan with fear in his eyes.

Nathan uncovered his mouth and stepped back. The drunk stayed on the ground and continued to look fearfully at Nathan, who smiled and spread his arms saying "there we go, see? No one's dead. And that will remain the case…" he leaned down and sat on his heels looming over the man "if you tell me where Pratchett lives."

The man whimpered slightly and pushed himself along the roof away from Nathan, who stood back up and followed him as he went. "It really is that simple. Tell me and I'll let you go."

The man stopped crawling away and narrowed his eyes. "Just like that?" he asked suspiciously.

"Just like that." Was Nathans reply. He offered he man a hand. He hesitated, than took it. Nathan pulled him to his feet than waved a hand at the rooftops of the rest of the city "were is it?"

The man gulped than pointed to a manor on the outskirts of the city near the walls. The building was too far off the get any real detail on, but Nathan knew where his next step would take him.

Nathan grabbed the man's shoulder and blinked back down to the street. Once there he let him go and blinked back to the rooftop before the man could turn to face him. Nathan than looked back towards Pratchett's house. There was a dim light coming from the top floor windows, and he thought he could see someone's silhouette in one of the windows. He was planning to have a few words with that silhouette.

authors notes:

hey guys, thanks for reading this far. remember to leave a review so that i can improve.

Thanks!


	5. Chapter 5

Nathan weaved his way silently through the dark streets. After a few minutes he came the edge of town, with the road to Prattchet's house laid out in front of him. He walked slowly now. He guessed that it was about eleven or twelve o'clock, plenty of time to deal with whatever was on the inside of that house and get back to the castle before the sun returned to the sky.

As he drew closer he could see the silhouette he presumed to be Prattchet simply pacing from one side of a room to another on the second floor of the manor. The manor was only two stories tall, which surprised Nathan slightly, as most people with stories like Prattchet's bought the biggest home they could find, and Nathan knew that there were larger homes around town. As he came closer to the home he found a tall wrought iron fence about four or five times Nathan's high. Too high to jump, probably too slippery too climb, and too high to blink over. The fence that was at the end of the path looked much better, it was only twice Nathan's height. He could easily jump it, but he had a feeling that just going in the front door would be a bad move.

When he reached the end of the path and came to the gate he examined it. It had a large embellished blue P in the middle with lime green fish to either side.

"Huh. FishFace." He said to no one in particular as he started walking to the left of the gate. He was looking for any kind of abnormality in the gate. Holes, anything on the bars, anything out of the ordinary. After a few minutes of walking he had done a half circle around the fence and found nothing. As he circled back around the other side, however, he found a small hole. It looked like it had been dug recently and had a light powdering of snow over its top.

The hole looked like it was dug under the fence, and in it was a small box with a note on top. As soon as he saw the box he knew what lay within. He could feel the slow beating coming from the box as it there was a little heart inside. He picked up the note first and looked it over. The only thing written on it were the scrawled words

"As pay"

Nathan looked to the window he had seen Prattchet in and wondered if he was one of those crazy cultists, the ones who worshipped the Outsider. Such people tended to be quite insane, and that would fit with him ordering the death of Elsa.

He opened the box and took the hand sized plate of bone and placed it in a pocket close to his heart, glancing at the rune that appeared burned into its surface as it went. The same rune that was burned on his hand. He couldn't help but feel a bit… uncomfortable with the implication that Prattchet might be a cultist. He had never met one who didn't try and kill him.

He looked over the hole again, confirming that there was nothing else, and started back towards the gate.

When he got there the gate was as easy to get past as he had expected. One leap and a supernatural gust of wind later and he was on the other side. The yard of the manor had about half a foot of snow, just like the rest of the town, but looked undisturbed. Not even any footprints to the gate from the doors of the house. Whatever Prattchet was doing in there he had been doing for a while.

Nathan walked to the house. He could now see that its exterior was made mostly of whitewashed wood and the same radically slanted brown roof shared by almost every other building in the city. He didn't see and balcony or other such protrusion from the smooth sides of the house, which meant that he would have to find either a door or a window.

He looked behind him at the gate. There was nothing, but he felt like he was being watched. All that he saw out of the ordinary was the snow disturbed by his feet moving back to its original place, looking as if he had never been there in the first place thanks to one of his charms.

Now he walked a circle around the house, looking for any opening other than the front door. There was a small back door that led into what was probably a garden during the warmer months but now just looked like slightly larger mounds of snow around leafless trees. He tried the back door but it was locked.

He sighed. He wanted a silent entry, but if the front door was locked than he would have to use a window. Front door it was.

When he got to the front door he put a hand on the handle tentatively, there was no telling what Prattchet had put on the other side, what with him probably being insane. He turned the handle and opened the door just a crack. Something was giving resistance, pulling the door back. Not enough to keep the closed, but enough to be noticed. He let the door close slowly and it latched back to its frame.

Nathan bent down and placed an eye to the keyhole, preferring to know what was on the other side before he opened the door. He saw a thick wire tied around the doorknob on the other side, and the wire led off to a crossbow mounted in a vice sitting on a chair. The crossbow was pointed right at head level of the door so that anyone who opened the door would get a nasty surprise.

He knew that he could avoid the bolt it shot, but the bow firing would make noise. Not much, but it might be enough to alert someone in the house.

He decided to go in a window. He had wanted to avoid using any large powers, but it didn't seem he had any other option for entering into the house quietly. He decided that a window next to the front door would be best. He climbed into the windowsill and stood looking in as he focused. The mark on his left hand lit up briefly. He felt the shadows around him start to bend. And then all at once, they seemed to break from whatever was casting them. The air around him grew so dark that he felt almost suffocated. Than instantly he felt his body just… disappear. He was a shadow now, as fast and as quiet as the darkest of them. He moved through the glass of the window with extreme ease. He felt himself grow stronger as he entered the darkness of the house, away from the light of the moon. Even though he felt his inky black form grow stronger, he also felt if coming apart too. His shadow began to give way to his flesh once again. Than in another instant he was standing in the foyer of Prattchet's home.

Now the question was whether he should deal with Prattchet first and then search his house, or search the home and then kill him. He decided to search first.

He closed his eyes and called forth power, than dispersed it though the house. He started to feel al the shadows in the house. He felt a moving one, Prattchet's shadow, moving around upstairs still pacing. He felt the thick darkness of the basement, and felt several heartbeats echoing through the darkness. Most were below him, a basement of some kind, but there was one above his as well. There were too many to tell an exact number, but he felt he could safely guess three downstairs and one upstairs.

If Nathan hadn't been concerned before, he sure was now. The number of artifacts in this house was way higher than if he had just simply found a single rune, which did happen from time to time. He opened his eyes and the feeling of the shadows faded as he stepped lightly through the house opening doors and searching through drawers and cabinets for anything that may help him to know why Prattchet ordered the Queen to die.

The only place he found anything that even might help was a small office space with cabinets full of business files having to do with the logistics of fishing ships entering, exiting, and offloading in the harbor. The only thing he found there was a tattered piece of paper with a printed ship log on one side and in a messy scrawl on the other the words "IN MY DREAMS SHE WAITS". Strange, as most scribbling like this referred to the outsider as male, but Nathan supposed that the Outsider could have just changed it wasn't a hard thing to believe. And this appearing in dreams was nothing rare either, especially with so many artifacts.

He gave the room one last glance over to be sure he hadn't missed anything, but he found nothing more. It seemed there was nothing left to do on the ground floor, so he started to look for a way to the second. It took him a few minutes to find the stairwell but after he did he made his way up, taking care to keep his steps silent.

He pushed a door at the top of the stairs open slowly, being sure there was no trap set upon this one. There wasn't but he still opened it slowly and carefully. He could hear Prattchet now, muttering to himself. Nathan leaned around a corner and saw Prattchet pacing in his bedroom.

Prattchet seemed completely insane. He was muttering disjointed lined about "her" and how she was "stalking him" and how he had "failed her". Nathan was not completely how to proceed.

On one hand the man would be sentenced to death, charged with treason. But on the other hand he could have more information that may be valuable to Nathan. Nathan wasn't really sure what kind of information he could have, but these crazies always knew more than they should and dropped hints everywhere.

Nathan looked Prattchet up and down. He didn't look very strong, he almost looked malnourished as if he hadn't been eating. His hands were very boney and worked ceaselessly at his side like he was washing his hands. He was about a foot shorter than the average person, making him much less threatening than what Nathan had been imagining. What Nathan had been picturing in his mind was a huge beast of a man gibbering and gnashing his teeth with bone charms and runes bolstering his strength, but what he found was a short starving man whispering to himself in a terrified tone.

Prattchet needed to die, but he also needed information. Speak to Prattchet it was, than. Nathan stepped out of the shadows and stood upright when Prattchet turned away from him again. He positioned himself to where as soon as Prattchet turned around he would be facing Nathan and waited for Prattchet to do another round.

As soon as Prattchet turned around Nathan could almost feel his eyes dart right to him. Prattchet let out a primal howl and just ran right at Nathan. He had to admit, this move was certainly not what Nathan was expecting, but it would not be hard to deal with. As Prattchet got closer to him he shot a foot out and kicked him in the stomach. Prattchet's charge ended as soon as Nathan's foot connected, and he fell to the floor whimpering slightly. Nathan knelt down next to the fallen man, saying "Doing well, Prattchet?"

Prattchet growled in a menacing sort of way and lashed out at Nathan, who jumped back. Prattchet stood up unsteadily and raised his fists into a combat stance. Nathan drew his sword slowly, and as soon as he did Prattchet fell to his knees, whimpering again.

Nathan grabbed him by the neck and picked him up, lifting him off the ground, and placed the sharp edge of his blade to the man's neck. He didn't know why he had reacted to the blade like this, but he would take full advantage. "Why did you order a hit on Elsa?" Prattchet looked directly at him now, terror flooding his eyes. He made a few noises that may have been attempts to form words but just came out as gurgles and gasps.

Nathan realized that he was probably actually choking the short man, and loosened his grip. He asked again "Why did you try and kill the Queen?"

Prattchet looked at Nathan confused for a moment, than relief seemed to wash over him. He sighed and said "you're not with her." than seemed to relax completely, despite the blade at his throat. He smiled warmly at Nathan and said "You aren't with her? It's been forever since I talked to anyone else."

Now Nathan was the confused one. It seemed this man might be even more insane than he thought. More than just violently insane, anyways. But the strange things he said brought up even more questions. Who was this "She" and "Her" he kept talking about? He needed to figure this out. He pushed the razor sharp blade harder against the man's neck, stepped forwards, and lowered him slightly so that he would have to look up at Nathan. "If you don't tell me" Nathan threatened "I'll cut you're damn throat out."

Prattchet did something that Nathan did not expect. He started pressing his neck against his sword, saying "yes, yes please! Please, kill me!" as small beads of blood began to drip off the blade.

Nathan pushed him away and dropped him at the same time, resulting in him falling to the ground in a rather undignified way. He got back up quickly though, and started trying to throw himself into Nathans blade. Nathan put out the hand not holding the blade to push him away and tried to think about what his next move should be.

Before Nathan could decide what he should do Prattchet made a grab for the crossbow on Nathan's belt. Nathan made a jump back to stop him from actually getting the crossbow. Prattchet started running at Nathan and fell to his knees.

"Please… Please kill me!"

Nathan thought for a moment, then said "if… if you tell me what I want to know I'll kill you."

Prattchet stood up, tears in his eyes. He looked like he was at the breaking point. Nathan almost felt sorry for the guy. Whatever had happened or been happening to him seemed to have really messed him up.

Prattchet looked at him suspiciously and said "You will?" and a big smile came across his face. "Finally, someone willing to end it!" he turned away from Nathan and started pacing excitedly. "You have no idea how many people I have asked already! All of them denied, of course. I can't really blame them though. Killing someone is a big deal."

Nathan shuffled uncomfortably and said "Depends on your point of view, I suppose." Than he stepped forward "but before I do I need you to tell me about why you ordered the Queens death."

Prattchet turned back to Nathan and drew a small book off of his belt, tossing it to Nathan. He caught it and started flipping through the pages with one hand. The next thing he knew Prattchet was almost on top of him, clawing at the book, screaming "No, No not yet! Not until I die!" Nathan dropped the book and threw Prattchet off. From the dull thudding sound he made when he hit the floor hid head was the thing that hit hardest. He lay there dazed, and Nathan considered running him through right then, but Nathan hadn't had an opportunity to look at the book. Not enough at least. He picked the book up again and leafed through the pages. It looked to be a diary of some kind, and from what Nathan could tell it was very well kept with consistent entry's every day.

Prattchet picked himself up off the floor and threw himself at Nathan again, but stopped short only about half a foot away. He looked down and saw Nathans blade buried hilt deep in the center of his chest. He looked back up at Nathan and saw him still leafing through the book with one hand, and the other was holding the blade. Nathan looked up from the book and said in a quiet voice

"I keep my word"

Nathan pulled his blade out of Prattchet's chest and turned to leave the room. He stopped when he heard Prattchet trying to gasp out a few last words. Figuring that no one's last words should go completely ignored, he turned and knelt down over Prattchet, who had fallen over at some point.

Prattchet gasped and sputtered in the way that most dying people did. He reached up and grabbed Nathans shirt, pulling him closer. He coughed up some blood than whispered "thank… y-you. You ha-have t-to stop h-her."

Nathan pulled away slightly and asked "her?"

Prattchet laughed, spewing more blood from his mouth and tapped the small book in Nathan's hand "It's a-all in th-there." He smiled, sighed, and looked past Nathan, the light leaving his eyes.

Nathan remembered the bone charm he had felt up here and looked at Prattchet's belt. Sure enough there it was, clipped to the dead man's side. Nathan felt a slight guilt in just leaving it, so he picked it off the strip of leather and placed it in one of his many pockets. He didn't know what it did but he would check later.

Remembering the several other artifacts he had felt in some kind of basement he went on a search that lasted about an hour for a way to get to this basement. Once he got in he took the few runes and left the dead man's estate.

He couldn't wait to report a successful mission to Elsa. To prove he wanted to help.


	6. Chapter 6

Anna couldn't believe this. She pounded the door again, shouting "Elsa open this door right now!"

The only response she got was more retching sounds and something that might have been speech but slurred beyond recognition. Kristoff put a hand on her shoulder but she shrugged it off and kept pounding the door. "Elsa open up!"

Kristoff pulled her away from the door and grabbed her shoulders to keep her in place and said "Anna, she won't open the door." He looked at the door sadly "just let he be until morning."

He turned and found himself face to face with someone who hadn't been there before. He recognized him as the man who had saved Anna and Elsa from the men who had tried to kill them last night. Kristoff jumped back in surprise, knocking Anna to the floor. The man stood there and smiled at them like he was trying not to laugh.

Anna was the first to speak. "Who… how did you get here?"

His smile widened even more as he drew something from one of his pockets. Anna caught the glimmer of something metal but couldn't make out what it was before the man held it out to Kristoff, who held out his hand nervously. The man dropped the metal into Kristoff's hand and turned his attention to Anna.

"So" he said to Anna, pointing a thumb to the door "does this happen often?"

Anna assumed he was referring to Elsa locking herself away and drinking. "No, this… this is really out of the ordinary. She doesn't even like alcohol!"

Kristoff held up the thing that the man had given him casting a questioning look to Anna. She could see now that it was a small brass key. "But…" she looked from the key to the lock and back again "how…" she stuttered pointing to the key.

The man looked followed her finger to the key, then said "Well, are you going to use it or not?" slapping Kristoff's shoulder. Kristoff turned awkwardly to unlocked the door. As he fumbled with the key, Anna turned and said nervously to the man "Thank you."

He raised an eyebrow and asked "For?"

She almost gasped and said "For saving my life! I just…" she shuffled uncomfortably "don't know where I would be without you."

Nathan bowed slightly and replied "Think nothing of it."

Anna was about to say something more, but before she could Kristoff got the door open and Nathan turned his attention to what lay inside the room. Anna remembered suddenly why they had been trying to open this door and rushed past Nathan and Kristoff, barging into the room and got hit full on with the stench of bile and alcohol.

Anna saw Elsa's feet poking out from behind an overturned table and ran over to her as fast as she could while gaging and blinded. When she reached the table she let out a gasp and picked Elsa's head off the floor. She could tell that Elsa was still breathing, but she was obviously not going to be too happy tomorrow.

Nathan leaned up against the door frame and motioned for Kristoff to go in next. He rushed in and knelt next to Anna over Elsa and started checking the unconscious queen over. Nathan couldn't help but to shake his head. Things had certainly been interesting since he arrived. He walked over to where the queen lay and saw that she was lying in a puddle of her own sick, her ornate crystalline dress splattered with what looked to be wine and rum.

He looked around the room and saw countless bottles, some half full but most were empty. Many of the bottles looked as if they were covered with frost, and a few of them looked as if the contents were actually frozen solid. And, now that he looked, it seemed that most of the bile in several places on the floor was totally frozen. He had to wonder how much control Elsa had over her powers, as all this seemed to be totally unintentional.

If control over her power could be eroded so much by just alcohol than it seemed that she would be fairly dangerous. He had heard whisperings that she had lost control once, but had been unable to get any real specifics. From what he had heard, though, it was bad.

He turned back to the body of Elsa and the two tending to her and said "so…" he was pretty unsure of how to go about this. "I had business with the Queen, but…" he pointed to her laying on the ground and continued unsurely "but I suppose that it will have to wait."

Both Anna and Kristoff turned to him and just looked at him for a moment before Anna stood and walked him out of the room. "I'll have someone show you to a room for the night. We'll…" she looked back at Elsa still lying on the floor "We'll talk tomorrow."

…

Elsa found herself seated on the throne in the ballroom. She didn't remember coming here, but there was a lot she didn't remember. There was something off though, she couldn't place it. As if the room had been shifted or crooked to the side just a also seemed that the many lamps that lined the walls of the room were giving off a slight purple-ish light instead of the usual bright warm light. She felt uneasy here, wherever "here" was. It was like she was being watched.

She stood up from the ornate throne and stepped forward. As soon as she left the throne ice sprang from the floor and covered it completely. She jumped back in shock and felt herself collide with what felt like a person. She turned to look at who she had hit, ready to apologize, and found herself looking at the back of the man who had saved her last night. As soon as her back stopped touching him ice sprung up and engulfed him too.

She recoiled, horrified at what she was doing. This was a dream. It had to be. She took a few deep breaths to calm herself down and looked around again. The ballroom was filled with people, just as it had been last night. The man who had saved her was standing in front of her. She looked around in awe at the crowds, who were just frozen in place with shocked expressions. It was like time was just… stopped. The three men who had tried to kill her were all present as well, two frozen in the process of charging towards her and one taking aim.

Than a voice echoed through the ballroom, making her jump again. It was a dull monotone voice sounding only partially interested in talking with her.

"Hello, Elsa."

She spun, ready to face whatever bizarre adversary this dream could throw at her, but found only a man. He was hovering over the back of the throne as shadows danced behind him obstructing everything else as if to highlight him. He wore common clothes and had hair almost as black as his eyes. If she had to guess she would have said that his eyes were shadow if she couldn't see the lights of the hall reflecting off of them.

He spoke again, and Elsa felt as if she had to listen as if she didn't have any choice in the matter.

"You don't know me, Elsa, but I know you." He said, gesturing to her. "I've watched over you over these long years you've been alive with…" he leaned forwards "unusual interest." he continued "from the day you were born you've wondered why you had the powers you do. They come from me. Every shard of ice and patch of frost has been drawn from my power."

The man leaned back and spread his arms casually "It amuses me." And smiled knowingly at her. She almost interrupted, but found she couldn't "It amuses me to see what different people do with different powers." He looked directly at her now, intently, as if he was telling her something he wanted her to remember "there was once a time when people with your powers and abilities would duel, and would draw people from every corner of the globe. Even the most powerful emperors would bow a knee to the combatants before they started." He squinted at Elsa as if he was reading her like a book "And now they hide their power, or at least you have." He said almost accusingly.

Elsa was immediately aware that she could talk again, and decided to ask a question. "Where am I?" she asked confusedly, looking around again at the frozen faces of the hall. The man looked around as well, smiling, and said "This is my world. This is where I choose to stay. This is the void. Nothing, at least, nothing for most people." He pointed to Elsa casually "But you're special. You aren't like most people. You may not bear my mark as literally as others, but you do bear my power. I give the ability to do anything, anything you can make happen then watch what happens next."

Elsa's mouth hung open and she just stood there, confused. One more question came to mind as she asked "Why me?"

The man looked at her as if she had just asked why the sky was green. "Why you?" he repeated "why you? Why not someone else. Why not someone who wanted this power, who prayed to me for this power. Those people are always so…" he seemed to savor the word "boring."

The next thing she knew she was thrashing in the sheets of her bed, feeling like her skull was in shards stabbing into her brain. She stopped flailing and looked around, out of breath. She was back in her bedroom. She couldn't help but wonder how she had gotten there, as the last thing she remembered was getting into the celler.

….

Nathan paced around anxiously. The promise that the royals would discuss his… employment was comforting, but he was uneasy about what they would consider. Would they think he was too harsh, as he had killed everyone that he had come up against except the drunks. That might make him come off a bit strong. But isn't that what they would want? He growled in frustration. Why didn't he know these things?

He conjured power and focused it into his left hand. The mark on the back of his hand lit up brightly and he gestured to his own shadow. Instead of pulsing his power he let it seep slowly so that it wouldn't take anything off of his overall energy. Slowly, his shadow peeled off of the ground, warping and bending into a standing position. He put more power into the spell and the shadow grew darker until looked completely solid. A bead of sweat dropped from his brow as he put just a little bit more power into the spell, and the shadow separated from him completely, now a freestanding shadow copy of Nathan. He stopped the flow of power and stepped back, admiring his work.

Next he drew his blade and took up a combat stance. As if there was some unspoken understanding between the two, the shadow drew a similar blade of shadows. The shadow lowered itself into a combat stance as well and both stood, waiting for the first move.

The shadow was the first to attack. With unnatural speed it lunged, thrusting its blade forward. Nathan barely had time to react. He stepped to the side and bent his wrist so that the blade's tip was still pointing at the shadow. As it reached the full extension of its lunge Nathan thrust the blade out in a move that left his arm awkwardly extended to his side. The shadow seemed to realize the position of Nathan's blade at the same time he started to thrust. It was already in a lunge, so it would not be able to jump away as it would stumble. Instead it simply fell onto its back and kicked its legs up, rolling back a few steps and springing to its feet.

Nathan hissed exasperatedly though his teeth. If he had just been a little closer…

He interrupted his own thoughts with a sudden attack of his own. He bent his knees and back as much as he could, bringing his face inches from the floor, and dashed forward. As he got in range to attack he brought his blade to bear as he held it behind his back. The shadow didn't seem to notice what he was doing, which was fine by him. The shadow obviously expected him to stop short and attack more directly, but Nathan had no plans to. He ran past the shadow and felt the resistance on the blade. He passed the shadow, let go of his blade, and turned.

His blade was buried in the shadows stomach, suspended above the ground by the thick darkness. Nathan also saw the door to the room he was given open, with Anna standing in the doorframe looking shocked. The shadow figure shivered violently for a moment than flattened and flew across the floor at Nathan, making a high pitch hissing sound as it went. Nathan's blade clattered noisily on the floor making Anna jump.

Nathan walked to the blade and picked it up. Sheathing it, he said a bit awkwardly "Can I help you?"

Anna shuffled uncomfortably and said "I just wanted to talk."

Nathan clasped his hands together and strode towards her "Let's talk."

Anna turned and started walking down one of the many halls that filled the building. They passed several guards on the way who raised eyebrows at Anna when they saw Nathan, but Anna dismissed their concern with a wave.

"So…" she started nervously "how are you?"

Nathan shrugged and said "Fine, why?"

This seemed to loosen some fear in Anna, who turned to him and gripped his arm, saying "Please don't get mad at me when I ask you, but who are you? Where do you come from? I mean…" she gestured wildly around her "why are you here?" Nathan opened his mouth to respond but it seemed she wasn't done yet. "There are so many other kingdoms you could go to. Why here?" Nathan held up a hand in an attempt to stop her but she just kept railing on. "And… an-and you have powers!" she was almost shouting now and Nathan knew that anyone in the same wing of the building could probably hear her right now.

He grabbed her arm and pushed her against the wall behind her. "Anna" he said calmly "shut up." Perhaps he had overstepped some boundary, but if he did Anna gave no real sign of it other than to stop talking. He let go and backed off, saying "Yes, I have powers. My name is Nathan. I am here because I want to work for you." He spread his arms and said sarcastically "happy now?"

Anna took a shaky breath and brushed the hair out of her eyes. "I… sorry for freaking out." She turned and kept walking. "a-any ways" she continued "what are your powers? Were you born with them? They don't seem like Elsa's."

Nathan responded with a slight groan as he stretched his shoulders. "No, I wasn't born with my power, it was given to me. And from what I've heard of Elsa's power mine is very different." He didn't really want to talk about his past. It was something he was rather… sensitive about.

Anna looked at him interestedly and asked "You weren't born with them? Than how did you get them?"

Nathan sighed. He didn't want to lie, but if the questions got too specific he wouldn't have much of a choice.

"They were given to me by …" he searched for the right word "a friend."

"Oh" Anna said "I've heard of people being cursed with powers like Elsa's" she asked a bit timidly "could your powers be a curse?"

Nathan smiled a bit at this. "Perhaps. I think it would be for someone with less self-control than me." He looked at the ceiling "I have a lot of power, I just have no way to use it for myself," he looked back down "which I guess is why I want to work for you."

Anna stopped and turned to him again. "What do you mean you don't have a use of your power?"

Nathan shrugged. "I don't feel any need to kill people. Other people used to…" he stopped, realizing that she had almost gotten him talking about his past. He had said too much to stop, but he had to be more careful. "…to hire me to kill, but I never killed for myself."

Anna gulped and said "you used to be an assassin?"

He hesitated for a moment than responded "Yea, easy way to make a living. When you're me, anyway." Anna looked at him questioningly and he clarified "The powers and all."

"Oh…" Anna gave a small nod and turned, resuming the walk. "So what are your powers? I saw that…" she looked for the right word "…shadow you were fighting, what was that?"

Nathan smiled and said "Ah, that's one of them that I'm more proud of. I learned how to manipulate shadows a long time ago, but that one really pushes it to the limit. It's a spell than makes my own shadow into a physical thing and imbues it with my skills and knowledge. It's not alive, just sort of acts off of what I want it to do, using my skills and memory to do it. It's like a machine."

Anna looked down at her own shadow untrustingly "Can you do that with any shadow? Could you make my shadow tell you things about me?"

Nathan stroked his chin thoughtfully, and said after a short pause said "Mmm… no. first off shadows can't talk, but I think it would have the information. If I conjured your shadow and told it to show me to a specific part of the castle it would, provided you know where that part is. If I asked it to tell me where the part is it wouldn't do anything." He had never actually thought of using other people's shadows like that before. He had always just used his own as either a distraction or an extra blade in a fight. Using someone else's was quite a good idea.

Nathan grimaced as a sudden realization hit him. Why was he telling her any of this? He had already told her more than he ever told anyone else about his power. He cursed himself. Did this girl always appear this damn trustable? For all he knew she was planning to stab him in the back later, so anything she didn't know would be an advantage against her. But if he wanted trust from her he supposed it would have to go both ways.

But still…

He would at least have to wait until he spoke to Elsa and discussed the "Terms of Employment" with her. He supposed that she would want some explanation of how his powers worked and how he would protect her, and he didn't really have an answer other than "any way I can" which he almost knew wouldn't work.

He still hadn't had an opportunity to look through the book Prattchet gave him, and he did want to end this conversation with Anna. He cleared his throat and said "It's late, and I would like to be well rested for tomorrow." Not a lie, just not the whole truth.

Anna nodded and said "Can you find your room again? I know these halls can be a little confusing and…"

Nathan held up a hand "I can handle it."

Anna said "Ok" and turned to leave. After a few steps she turned back around gave him a small wave, saying "Good night."

Nathan waved in response and walked back through the halls to his room. It was a small room with a window that looked out over the fjord and out onto the open ocean. The room also had a small table and chair both made of wood and bearing ornate carvings of vines and various fruits. He sat down at the chair and pulled out the book, holding it to the light of a small candelabra on the wall.

The journal started off easily enough, with neat and practiced penmanship. The first entry was one that explained why Prattchet was bothering to keep a journal. The reasons he gave were that a friend he had had told him that keeping a journal was great for calming one's mind when stressed. Nathan felt that he disagreed, but supposed it would depend on the person.

He continued reading, and found that most of the entries were just dull descriptions of Prattchet's days. It was just entry after entry of boring day spent in an office or inspecting a ship or striking a trade deal. But then, right in the last quarter of the book there was an entry from about a month ago. It spoke of a dream he had one night. Nathan remembered the things Prattchet had been whispering to himself and read the entry out loud

"Last night I had a most frightful dream. I was on a ship, the Gulliver, the first ship I ever worked. I couldn't help but feel that something was wrong. I wondered the decks for some time before I found anything. As I came to the position I used to work, the netting of course as all greenhorns must, I found something that troubled me greatly. I saw the body of my old captain, entangled, hanging just out of reach above me. I tried to jump to reach him and possibly free him from the bonds, but every time I got close the net was yanked up by some unseen force. I had grown quite worried now, as despite any shouting or other such attempts to wake him he simply lay there unmoving. I turned to see if there were any gutting knives or other such tools that I may free him with, but on my turning I found myself facing a figure. It was feminine in structure and form, but wore a green cloak that obscured its identity completely. I asked who it was and the response I got shook me to my core. The figure dashed at me with inhuman speed and upon reaching me, the cloak was flung wide and great plumes of a sickly green gas were released. I shouted in shock, as I believe any other man would, and the gas came to life. It moved of its own accord and forced itself into my mouth and down my throat.

I awoke this morning screaming and sweating with the servants fawning over me. They told me that I had been shouting and thrashing for minutes before I awoke. I have never been a superstitious man, but now I have a feeling of dread that won't fade. I feel as if I am watched every moment of the day, no matter how extremely I isolate myself. I worry about what is happening."

Nathan paused before moving to the next entry. It certainly was not the Outsider, as Nathan seriously doubted that he would have constructed such a bizarre world that seemed only for the purpose of scaring Prattchet. If it wasn't the Outsider than who else could it be? Perhaps he would find the answer in later entries.

He flipped to the next entry. It was dated a week after the last one, which was strange as every entry up to this point was the day after the last entry. This entry was written in a much more scrawled hand, and was very hard to read. Nathan read:

"I have done away with all the servants. They could not be trusted anyways. She has rewarded me with a prize every time I do as she asks. She leaves them in a hole in the fence. I have watched the hole, waiting to see her deliver it but I never do. She tells me to kill someone, someone important, but I can't do it. She knows I can't too, and if I fail she will torture me like the others she showed me. I would rather die than become one of those husks. I gathered all the gifts around me and slept. It didn't help keep her away, but I feel more rested."

Nathan flipped to the next entry, still wondering who "she" was and now why she had been torturing Prattchet. The next entry was dated yesterday. It read:

"The men are going. The queen should be dead by nightfall, and she will have to leave me alone. I heard the Outsider today. He whispered in my ear through his runes and told me. He told me that there was a man who would kill me if I play my cards right. Better than what she would do with me."

Nathan paused again. Prattchet knew he was coming? He sighed. The Outsider worked in mysterious ways. The next entry didn't have a date on it at all and was barely legible. Nathan had to squint to make any of it out.

"they failed I know they did now she is coming. I heard through the runes he told me her name. I do not know what it means but she is…"

The name was illegible. It wasn't smeared or scratched out, it looked like it was in another language. Nathan flipped to the next page, finding it blank. He hissed through his teeth and flipped a few more blank pages. He dropped the book on to the table and put his face in his hands and just sit for a moment.

"Nothing is ever easy." He said to himself.

Nathan looked out the window at the moon. It was low, and he could see the light of the sun edging its way over the horizon. He didn't feel very tired, but felt he should at least try to get some sleep. He walked over to the bed and removed his gear slowly. Surprisingly for him, he fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow.


	7. Chapter 7

Nathan awoke to the sound of someone knocking softly on his door. He opened one eye just a crack and looked around. The room that greeted him was the same one he had fallen asleep in, and for that he was fairly grateful. It did mean, however, that he would have to deal with the strange first impression he had made. He groaned as he lifted himself from the bed and turned his attention to the door.

"Uhhgaah…"

He coughed, cleared his throat and tried again. "Yea?"

The voice from the other side of the door was fuzzy and hard to understand. "Uh… time to wake up!"

He looked out the window and saw the sun burning brightly in the winter sky as he threw his legs over the side of the bed and stood unsteadily.

"I'll be right out."

He stumbled over to his gear and equipped himself as quickly as he could. The last thing he did was to pull his long leather gloves on as he pulled the door open quietly, as he always did. He found himself facing Anna, who had her back turned to the door as she waited.

She was wearing simple noble clothes, a yellow dress with her hair up in a bun. Nathan tapped her on the shoulder, saying "You called?"

She gasped and turned, spinning to face him and clutching her chest. When she saw it was him she sighed in relief. "Good morning, Nathan." She curtsied politely and pointed to the floor "There's breakfast ready in the kitchens if you're hungry."

Nathan returned her curtsy with a bow of his own and said "Thank you for rousing me, my…" he paused, looking at her unsurely "How am I to refer to you?"

She shrugged her shoulders and said "Just Anna is fine."

Nathan nodded and started walking with Anna towards the stairs. He was still at a loss at to the layout of this building but he felt he was becoming more familiar with it every time he traveled the halls. He stopped walking and put a hand on Anna's shoulder, stopping her.

"Wait, does that mean I got the job?"

It came out with far more hope in his voice than he had meant to have, but he didn't care. He stared at Anna intently, who shrugged and smiled. "Elsa and I talked it over and…" she paused, as if for dramatic affect. "…yes."

Nathan felt a huge weight lift off his shoulders. He felt like he needed to scream, to run, to somehow express the immense relief he felt. But he didn't. What he did do was smile and feel himself go weak in the knees. He put his hand to the wall and braced himself against it for a moment, then pushed himself off and motioned for them to keep walking.

"Will the Queen be joining us for breakfast?"

Anna sighed annoyed and said "No, she's in a meeting with her advisors, so she'll probably be in there all day." Anna turned, walking backwards to face Nathan "Elsa doesn't get along with a lot of her advisors." And she turned back around.

Nathan thought about how drunk Elsa had been last night and cringed when he thought about how she must feel right about now. He imagined the hangover that such drinking would bring on and combined it with being trapped in a room full of people he didn't like droning on and on about things he didn't care about. He started to think about ways he might get her out of the meeting.

His thoughts were interrupted, however, when the smell of food drifted into his nostrils. The delicious smell of food changed his mind completely about what he should be focused on. As he came into the kitchen area with Anna he found cooks, at least ten, going at it fervently on the stoves, ovens, and bowls.

He had to wonder who ate all this food, as surely there weren't enough people on staff to eat this much. Anna walked forward and simply picked up a plate and started heaping food on. Nathan followed suit and grabbed a plate.

After he had gotten his pile of food he looked to the dining room for a place to sit. There were at least a hundred tables, most empty. At one he saw Anna siting and eating alone. He strode over, took a seat across from her, and started eating.

Nathan felt like he should say something to Anna instead of just eating in silence, but he didn't know what to say. Before he could figure it out though, a voice sounded from somewhere he couldn't see. It spoke in a rather flamboyant voice, saying "Hey Anna, who's your friend?"

Nathan cast his gaze around him, looking for the speaker but not finding anything. Anna put her fork and knife down, turned to the side, and looked down at something Nathan couldn't see. Her face lit up and she exclaimed "Olaf!" and bent over to pick up something.

When she came back up she was holding what Nathan initially thought to be a child covered in white paint. She set the thing down on the table next to her food and smiled at Nathan, who just stared at the thing trying to figure out what it was. It had sticks where its arms should have been, and its feet had seemed almost to disconnect from the body as Anna had lifted it. It also appeared segmented, its body being made of three sections.

Anna laughed at Nathans reaction. He turned to her and asked much more calmly than she had expected, yet in a way that made the whole scene funnier "What is that thing?"

Olaf shuffled forwards on the table holding both his arms wide, exclaiming "I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs!"

Nathan leaned back in his chair away from Olaf. Anna got her laughing under control and choked out as she was gasping for breath "He's something Elsa made."

Nathan leaned forwards now, his attention grabbed. "And does she control it?" he got up from the table and started circling the table to get a better view of the snowman.

Anna, having gotten her breathing under control, said "No, he pretty much just does whatever he wants."

Nathan stopped circling the table and addressed Olaf.

"So you have free will?"

Olaf looked himself over and shuffled his feet, then said "I think so, why?"

Olaf and Anna looked at him, both wanting to know the answer. Nathan sat back down and said "Because things like you" he gestured to Olaf "are usually controlled directly by a Witc-"he stopped short, catching himself and correcting what he almost said "summoner."

Anna seemed to catch what he had almost said, but Olaf just nodded and started rolling a salt shaker from one side of the table to the other. Anna looked at Nathan with a worried expression and mouthed the word "Witch?" to Nathan. He motioned towards the door with his head and stood up, he'd had enough food anyways. Anna said something to Olaf and followed Nathan.

As Nathan entered the halls Anna came to his side. He asked her "Where is Elsa?" Anna pointed down the hall and started walking. He knew Anna was concerned about what he had said, so he decided to put her fears to rest. "Most females who use magic are just called witches." He said without looking at her. He looked up at the ceiling, thinking. "Most people think badly when they think witch, myself included, but it doesn't actually mean a bad person."

He looked back at Anna and found her looking at him questioningly. She asked "Why do you think badly about witches?"

Nathan thought, wondering whether or not he should share this little bit of his past. There wasn't much she would be able to do with this knowledge, and it wasn't a memory that Nathan was particularly fond of, so he decided it couldn't hurt. "When I was a kid I had something of a run-in with a witch who…" his face darkened "… didn't take kindly to my being there."

Anna covered her mouth with her hand and said "What did she do to you?"

Nathan looked at her and raised an eyebrow. "Scared the piss outa me. If she'd done much more I doubt I'd be alive."

They came to a large door and Anna stopped. Nathan could hear voices faintly on the other side. Anna said "Well here we are." And shuffled uncomfortably. Nathan took a deep breath and put a hand on the door, ready to push it open.

Nathan looked over to Anna and said "are you ready?"

Anna rolled her eyes and said "How did I let you rope me into this?"

Nathan smiled and shrugged as he pushed the door open. The scene that greeted him was more or less what he expected. There were six people sitting around a table, all with various papers and documents in front of them. At the head of the table Elsa was sitting with her head resting on her hands, massaging her temples with her eyes squeezed shut. The six men around the table were arguing heatedly, and their argument seemed to be growing louder.

Nathan looked back at Anna and grinned wickedly. He held out his hand and motioned for her to take it. She did, albeit hesitantly, and Nathan focused on a spot of floor behind Elsa, waiting for a moment no one was looking. He only had to wait a few seconds, as a few of the man looked over at the open door. He pulsed his energy and turned to Anna, putting a finger to her mouth. For just a second her eyes bulged out like she was terrified, but she contained any noise.

Nathan now turned to Elsa and tapped her on the shoulder. She groaned and turned slowly. "What is it now?" she sounded irritated. She hadn't opened her eyes yet, and Nathan wasn't completely sure how he should address her. He turned to Anna and motioned for her to take over.

Anna cleared her throat and whispered to Elsa "Nathan needs to talk to you."

Elsa opened her eyes and looked up at Nathan, mouthing the words "Thank you" than got up and announced to the room of bickering men "Excuse me, but I have business to attend to. If you could leave us for a while, it would be appreciated."

All the men turned, looking surprised, than shuffled awkwardly out of the room. Once the door closed behind the last man Elsa turned back to Anna and Nathan. She gave a pained smile and asked "What did you need?"

Nathan motioned towards the chair she had been sitting in, indicating she should take a seat again, than motioned to another seat for Anna before taking a seat himself. Once everyone was seated Nathan pulled out the small book and slid it across the table to Elsa, saying "This belonged to the man who paid the three men to attack you." Elsa took the book slowly off the table and flipped through the pages. At one page she stopped and her eyes widened slightly

"Prattchet…" she looked up at Nathan and asked "…It was Prattchet? But he-"she shook her head and asked "Where is he now?"

Nathan cringed slightly, realizing that Elsa may have known him. "Dead. When I arrived he was quite out of his mind." Elsa looked down at the floor and Nathan felt a pang of guilt. He considered saying that he had asked to die, but thought that it might just upset Elsa more.

She looked up and nodded towards the book "So what else is in here?"

Nathan took the book and flipped to the last page that had writing on it and handed it back, pointing to the word he couldn't understand. "I believe that's the name of the person who drove him insane. Unfortunately I can't read it, can you?"

Elsa picked up the book and looked closely at the word. After a few moments of silence she dropped the book and cringed, putting a hand to her forehead. "I'm sorry, I can't read it either." Anna drew her chair closer and put her hands on Elsa's shoulders, asking worriedly "Are you ok?" then looked at Nathan as if asking for help.

Nathan was about to tell them that there was nothing he could do, that a hangover simply had to run its course, when he remembered something. He reached into one of his many pockets and drew out a small bone charm. It hummed with a strange energy, and merely it touching his hand made his fingers start to go numb. He held out the strange artifact to Elsa, who just looked at him questioningly. "Take it." He said reassuringly. Elsa obeyed, taking the bone from Nathan's hand. As soon as she picked it up her face loosened and the tension seemed to just fall away. She sighed happily and touched the thing to her forehead.

Anna looked from the charm to Elsa to Nathan, then said confused "Wait, what did I miss here?"

Nathan turned to her as Elsa opened her eyes again and put the charm in her hand and rested the side of her head against it. "It's a bone charm," he explained "it's a little trinket that uses the same kind of magic I do." He pulled his thick top jacket aside revealing the bandoleer of six bone charms. "They give little benefits here and there. That one..." He pointed to the one in Elsa's hand "…dulls pain."

Anna eyed the charm suspiciously and said "I don't like the noise its making."

Elsa looked at Anna and said "What noise? It's not making any noise."

Both girls looked at Nathan. He shrugged and said amusedly "If she hears a noise, I guess she hears a noise." Something occurred to Nathan and he continued "Anna doesn't have the power that you and I-"he pointed from Elsa to himself "-have, so she may be more…" he searched for the right word "…susceptible to the effects of charms."

Now it was Elsa's turn to look at the charm with distrust. Nathan gave an exasperated sigh and said "It won't do any harm to her, that takes a lot of time. Sometimes charms drive people insane, but only when they've had the charm for a long time, usually years." This seemed to satisfy Elsa, who continued resting her head against the charm. Anna kept glancing occasionally at the charm but otherwise didn't seem bothered.

Nathan cleared his throat after a short pause and spoke to Elsa. "What should be done with this-" he tapped the book "business? Certainly we should do something about this, but what? We can't just wait for another attack."

Elsa looked down at the book and sighed, saying "I'll have the name copied and sent out to anyone how might know what it says, but beyond that I don't know what to do."

Nathan nodded and said "With so little information there's not much we can do."

The three just sat in silence, thinking. After about thirty seconds of this Elsa stood up and addressed Anna. "I think you should show him around the castle. If he's to defend it he needs all the information he can get."

Anna stood and nodded, motioning for Nathan to follow her. As Nathan stood to leave Elsa grabbed his hand. He turned to look at her and found her offering the bone charm back. He held up a hand and said "keep it for now, you need it more than I do."

Elsa smiled and said "Thanks." She took the charm in her hands and turned it over. As it turned, bands of ice formed over the surface and linked with each other on the opposite side. Then she worked the charm around in her hands, and a small chain of ice formed in her hand and linked to the bands. She put the chain around her neck and let the charm hang on her chest.

Nathan shook his head, smiled, and turned to leave. Some part of him envied her, jealous that she had been able to do that so easily. But another part of him reminded him that she lacked the ability to use shadows and move faster than the eye could see.

Anna was waiting for him on the other side of the door. As Nathan left the room the six men who had been inside before shuffled back in, grunting and grumbling things he could just barely make out. "Unnatural…" "Dangerous…" and of course his favorite, "Not right…"

Anna shook her head and said "don't listen to them. You'd think they'd be more open to magic, considering Elsa's powers."

Nathan smirked "Let them be afraid if they want, I don't care."

Anna felt like she needed to change the subject. "So, what happened with the witch?"

Nathan sighed. "I guess I've not got much to lose." He didn't really want to talk about his past, but if she wanted to know, he wouldn't keep it from her. "I used to be an orphan. The orphanage I stayed at wasn't exactly swimming in money. I spent most of my time stealing things. Food, pens, pocket watches, anything that I could use to feed myself with." Nathans eyes seemed to fog as he thought back. "After a while I started stealing more than just food."

They came to a room with several chairs and a large window overlooking the fjord and Nathan took a seat, motioning for Anna to follow suit. "You'd be surprised with how much food can be bought with a shiny ring." He waved a hand as if dismissing the thought "but, anyways, I was in a jewelry store, doing what I did, when I heard a crash upstairs. I figured that the owner of the shop might be drunk or something, so I went to check it out." Anna was sitting on the edge of her seat, listening intently. Nathan readjusted in his seat and continued "so I went to check it out. Figured he might have fallen and knocked himself out, you know, drunk and all. What I found when I got up there was…" he stopped, gazing off into the distance "not pretty. The jeweler was standing in his bedroom, whimpering and cowering from something I couldn't see. What I could see, though, was crows. There must have been hundreds of crows, all swarming and swooping around the room. The jeweler was screaming something about not knowing where something was, and every time he did the birds got angrier."

Nathan paused and smiled to himself. He had almost forgotten how fun talking to people could be. "Just as I was starting to think that leaving might be a good idea, the door bust off its hinges and fell on top of me. The guy stopped screaming and made a break for it. He stepped on the door as he ran, which hurt a lot. The door felt like it was crushing me, so I screamed. Next thing I knew the door was off of me and birds were holding me up in the air. Then I saw her. She looked pretty old, and I'm talking like hundreds of years old, and she had crows all over her." Anna actually gasped at this point, which made Nathan smile. "She had a real raspy, gritty voice, like two rocks grinding together. She says "You're not supposed to be here" than the birds just…" he flicked his wrist "threw me out the guy's bedroom window."

Anna sat in her chair, her eyes wide and her hand covering her mouth. "Did… did that really happen?" she whispered.

Nathan laughed and said "Yea, crazy, isn't it?" He stood and looked around the room, than pointed a thumb over his shoulder at the door. "So, should we keep-"

Anna interrupted him with a start, saying "Oh. Oh yes, sorry. It's just…" Nathan held up a hand as if to say he understood, than motioned to the door. Anna walked out of the room and he followed her.


	8. Chapter 8

After the lengthy tour of the castle had concluded Anna and Nathan returned to the conference room in which Elsa was having her meeting. They both agreed to wait outside the room until it was done to talk to Elsa again. Nathan felt better about his familiarity with the building, and he had found several points where security was a bit lacking. As they had walked through the rooms and halls, in-between Anna telling him what a room was and why it was there, she told him about when Elsa had lost control of her powers.

Anna seemed to think that the loss of control was normal, but the thought troubled Nathan far more. The idea that Elsa was as powerful as everyone said and didn't have complete control was… scary. He had always had complete control, he couldn't even imagine his powers acting on their own. He added that to his mental list of things he needed to talk to Elsa about.

They waited for the meeting to conclude outside of the door. Several times Nathan heard through the door peoples voices rising almost to shouting. Anna put her eye to the lock on the door a few times to see what was going on, but Nathan refrained. It all seemed like the same boorish politics to him, just men shouting about taxes and goods and immigration and other things he couldn't possibly care less about.

After about half an hour there was a kind of murmuring consensus of voices and the door opened and the six men started walking out, talking amongst themselves looking flustered. Nathan and Anna stood and waited for the men to pass and, once they did, entered the room.

Elsa was sitting at the head of the table as she had been the first time they had entered, this time looking more tired than in pain. She looked up from a paper she had in front of her and smiled when she saw them. "Well this is a present surprise." She said, smiling at them and standing up.

Anna ran over and hugged Elsa, asking "How'd it go?"

Elsa's grin widened and she said "I think they see everything my way now." She looked at Nathan and put a hand to the charm around her neck "And I couldn't have done it without your help."

Nathan took a step forward and asked "Sorry, what did I help with?"

Elsa sighed and said "They are always badgering me about increasing the size of the treasury and raising taxes and speeding the "growth of the country". Your little charm made it…" She paused, considering the word "…tolerable."

Nathan shrugged and said "Perhaps a little growth would benefit Arendelle."

Elsa threw a hand towards the window overlooking the city and said agitatedly "And it has been growing. At a slow, steady pace. There's no need to try and cover the world!"

Nathan jerked back a bit surprised, but nodded, agreeing with Elsa. He realized this was another thing he was starting to like about her, she didn't feel the need to increase her own power.

Elsa sighed again. "I'm sorry, it just that I've been trapped in a room with a pack of wolves all day, I'm a bit on edge."

Nathan shuffled a bit uncomfortably and Anna looked sideways at Elsa before awkwardly saying "O…k, well, let's all just… go have a nice lunch and talk about things. Ok?"

Both Nathan and Elsa exchanged glances and shrugged, moving to the door. Anna led the way back to the dining hall with Nathan and Elsa following. As they trailed behind they started to talk. Elsa was the first to speak. She turned her head to Nathan, putting a hand to the charm he had given her and said "really, thank you for this."

Nathan waved off her words and took a fist-sized bag from an inner pocket. "Think nothing of it, I've got plenty more where that came from." He started removing charms at random, putting them to his ear, than placing them back in the bag.

Elsa eyed what he was doing with curiosity. "And what do the creepy bones tell you?" she said sarcastically, rolling her eyes and breaking another smile. She figured that he was just putting on a little act to try and freak her out, and she wasn't about to let it work.

Nathan smiled devilishly at Elsa and said "All sorts of things." After a short pause he laughed to himself, then said "They make a sound, if you listen for it. You can tell what they do if you pay enough attention." He handed a random charm to Elsa and said "See if you can tell."

She took the charm in her hand and examined it closely. There didn't seem to be any real visual markings other than slight burns that would tell her what the thing did, so she hesitantly placed it up to her ear. At first the charm didn't make any noise, but as she listened and focused something seemed to happen. It was like the charm started to hum slightly. As she focused on the noise it grew until it was almost defining.

She cringed away from the charm and held it out to Nathan. He smiled and said "Don't focus too much." then pushed the charm back. She wasn't sure what he meant by that but she tried again, this time not listening to the sound itself but to what it sounded like.

It sounded bizarre. Otherworldly, almost. As if it had been pulled straight out of another world. She tried to compare the noise to anything she had heard before, and could only think of grinding metal combined with…a whale's song. She had heard whales sing before, on several trips made by ship, and the sound never failed to send an uncomfortable chill down her spine. There were several other sounds coming from the charm, like distant whispering and a kind of hissing, but those were almost too faint to place.

Elsa looked to Nathan and asked "What am I listening for?"

Nathan raised an eyebrow and said "Can't hear it?"

Elsa shook her head and replied "No, I hear too much. I can't make anything out."

Nathan shrugged, than grunted and said "Maybe…" and paused, thinking, than continued "Maybe you are focusing too much on what it is, focus on what it does." He paused again "Focus almost on the space around it. How it changes what should be, not what it is."

Elsa looked back at the charm and tried focusing on her hand. What did her hand feel, what was different? She squeezed the charm in her fingers and felt a few sharp points poke her fingertips. She squeezed harder, but no matter how hard she did it seemed the points weren't sharp enough to penetrate her skin. She looked at the points and gasped when she saw them. They looked sharp enough to rip her skin off if she wasn't careful, but she had just been squeezing hard enough force to send a few of the sharper looking ones through her hand entirely.

She looked at her hand. It looked normal enough, her skin fair and soft looking. But the hand felt strange. If she wasn't looking at it she would've sworn she was wearing a glove. She closed her hand again and felt her skin move. It was like her skin didn't want to move, like her whole hand was covered in calluses. She pinched the hand and found that the skin was actually as thick as it felt. She turned back to Nathan and said excitedly "It makes calluses!" She was proud that she had been able to figure it out.

Nathan looked at her and held out a hand. She put the charm in his hand and he held it up to his ear. He listened for a few seconds, then smiled at Elsa and said "Good job, you got it."

He placed the charm back in the bag and drew another, handing it to Elsa. She took it and started examining it in the same way she had the first. Nathan addressed Anna as Elsa focused on the charm. "So, where's the guy you were dancing with at the party?"

She spoke over her shoulder so she didn't have to turn around. "Kristoff? He's up north." She turned to look at Nathan and, at seeing the questioning expression on his face, said "He works as an ice harvester, and there are a lot of mountain lakes up north."

Nathan nodded. "How long have you known him?" he asked curiously. He didn't particularly care about the romantic affairs of the royals, but he was the protector now, so he supposed he should familiarize himself with the people they were close to.

"A few months." Anna responded happily and continued walking.

Nathan knew they were nearing the dining hall now, as he was starting to smell the food. He glanced to his side at Elsa, who was still examining the bone charm. He didn't want to interrupt her because she seemed to enjoy deciphering charms. He looked back at Anna and asked "How did you meet him?"

She looked over her shoulder and said "I'll tell you while we eat."

With that they came to the door to the dining hall and entered. The scene was more or less the same one that Nathan had entered to during breakfast, with huge amounts of food piled onto large plates on a table near the center of the room.

They all got their food and sat down at a round table to eat. Nathan got a plate with mostly cured meat, Anna got a plate of mostly salads, and Elsa got a plate of both. Nathan looked at Elsa's plate and did a double take. She had about twice the amount of food he did on her plate. He looked to Anna with concern. She seemed to see it to, and said to Elsa "Are… you ok, Elsa?"

Elsa looked up at Anna from the charm with a puzzled expression. "What? Yes, fine, why?"

Nathan gestured to her plate and said "you seem quite hungry."

Elsa looked at Nathan's and Anna's plates and asked "Is that enough? There's plenty more food, if you want."

Nathan and Anna exchanged looks again. Nathan shrugged and started eating, and Anna followed suit. Elsa looked suspiciously between the two and started eating her food. In-between bites of food Nathan started to talk to Anna again. "So how did you and Kristoff meet?"

Anna finished what food she was eating and started off in what Nathan could tell was going to be a story.

"Well, I met him a few months ago when I went looking for Elsa and had a little bit of an adventure. He helped me get to the north mountain, which is where Elsa made her ice castle."

Nathan raised an eyebrow and looked over at Elsa. "Ice castle?" he sighed and leaned back. "You'll have to show me all of these fantastical powers later."

Elsa looked up briefly, nodded, and went back to her food. Nathan snickered slightly and Anna just looked at her with concern again and continued awkwardly.

"…so anyways, Elsa threw us out because she wanted to be alone, and he took me to see the trolls because Elsa froze my heart."

Elsa's ravenous eating slowed, and Nathan asked "Froze your heart? What does that mean?"

Anna sighed and explained "It's like a curse. Slowly after she struck me with her powers I froze." She looked like she didn't really want to talk about it, but she had Nathan's interest now.

"A curse? What does that mean? And you froze, as in, like, to death or solid?" Nathan said, leaning forward again.

Anna nodded and said "Yes."

Nathan gave a low whistle, impressed at the things Elsa was being credited with. He didn't know whether or not to believe all the claims, but the claims themselves were very impressive. Something occurred to him, and he asked "And… how are you not dead?"

She smiled at Elsa, who looked up from her food again and smiled back, and said "I found true love. My love for Elsa thawed my heart and saved my life."

Nathan's eyebrows raised again and he said, a bit confused "Your love… saved you…" he pointed at Elsa "…from her."

Anna nodded and smiled at him. He, however, didn't buy it. Not entirely, anyways. He looked over at Elsa again and found most of the food that had been on her plate was gone. He looked at her and saw she was still going strong, eating the rest of the food and showing no sign of slowing. He looked back to Anna and said "Right, well, I would like to see Elsa's powers. Today, if possible."

Anna looked at Elsa, who didn't appear to have heard Nathan as she continued devouring the food. She shrugged her shoulders and pointed a fork at Elsa, saying "you'll have to ask her."

Nathan looked at his plate. What food he had gotten was gone. He set his cutlery down and leaned back in his chair, waiting for Elsa to finish. Anna did the same, and they both sat in silence. It was several minutes until Elsa finished her food, and when she did she held the charm up to her eyes again and said aggravated "I still can't figure out what it does!"

Something clicked into place in Nathan's mind and he motioned for Elsa to hand the charm to him. She did and he put it to his ear. After a few seconds he sighed and set the charm down. Elsa looked at him concernedly and asked "What's the matter, is something wrong?"

Nathan smiled and said "No, but I know why you ate such a huge amount of food."

Elsa raised her eyebrows and asked "What large amount? I didn't eat…" she looked at Nathan's and Anna's plates than back to her own "…oh." She looked back at Nathan and asked "So what does the charm do?"

Nathan looked at Anna, than back to Elsa before answering. "This…" he held the charm up so both could see it "is a charm called "Hearty Appetite", a fitting name, I think." Both of them looked at him confused.

"What is the benefit of wanting to eat more?" Elsa asked.

Nathan paused and thought. "Well, you probably won't want to eat any dinner tonight." He answered.

Elsa stood up from the table quickly and said "So you wanted to see my powers?"

Nathan stood from the table as well and nodded. Anna looked between the two and stood up as well. "Can I come and watch?" she asked, a little concerned.

Elsa turned to her and said "Of course, why wouldn't you?"

Anna looked a little relived and shrugged, saying "I don't have cool magic powers, I guess."

Elsa smiled and hugged Anna. She said "oh, Anna, you don't need powers. You're still my sister."

Anna smiled warmly at Elsa and said "thanks sis." And returned the hug.

Nathan shuffled uncomfortably behind the random scene of affection. He hoped things like this wouldn't happen often, as they made him feel rather uncomfortable. He waited a few seconds and when the two showed no signs of breaking their embrace he cleared his throat. Elsa looked up from the embrace at Nathan. He pointed a thumb over his shoulder and said "Should we… you know… go?"

Elsa let go of Anna, who did the same, and they both looked at Nathan. Anna asked "where are we going to have this little demonstration?"

Elsa pointed out a window at the courtyard, saying "We could do it out there." Then she looked at Nathan who shrugged and said "Sure, it'll work fine."

.

.

Authors Thing

sorry for the delay(Hah, five days is a delay)  
thanks so far for reading, i hit a bit of a block with this chapter. but i think its done.  
If anyone knows where i could put this story so more people can see it could you tell me so i can put it there and more people see it.  
so thanks, and as always leave a review.

Thanks


	9. Chapter 9

They walked out to the courtyard. Elsa and Nathan faced off in the center of the courtyard and Anna took a seat on the stairs by the door to the castle. The courtyard was covered in a light dusting of snow that had fallen the night before. Several guards patrolling the wall were looking over at the strange scene in the yard. Elsa spoke to Nathan nervously "What do you want me to do?"

Nathan shrugged nonchalantly and responded "Whatever you can, I guess. Just give me an idea of what you can do."

Elsa started working her hands together, and a bright blue light started coming from her hands. She continued to work it around and after a few moments there was a distinguishable ball of blue light. She cast it into the air far above their heads. It reached about up to the highest point of the castle, than burst into thousands of brightly glowing snowflakes. Nathan nodded, impressed with the ease she had conjured such a spell with. He had seen it before, though, when he entered the party the first day he had arrived.

He motioned for Elsa to come to him and she did. "That was good." He said approvingly. Elsa opened her mouth, about to say something, but Nathan held up a hand to interrupt her. "Good, but I was thinking something more…" he waved a hand, looking for the word. "…potent."

Elsa nodded and took a step back from him. She tensed herself up and readied herself. She tried to clear her head as much as she could so she would have the most control possible. She shot a small ball of magic out of her hand at the ground a small distance away. The ball dissipated on impact, but in its place a shard of ice about half Nathans size sprang from the stone and pointed itself back at her. She looked at Nathan hopefully.

Nathan pointed at the shard and asked her "Can you still manipulate that?"

Elsa looked back at the shard and pulled her hand towards her. The shard's tip lengthened quickly and stopped inches from Elsa's head. She grabbed the tip of the shard and snapped it off, taking it in her hand. Nathan pointed to the broken tip of the shard with the same look he had had when looking at the whole shard. Elsa could tell what he was about to ask, and answered before he could. The shard tip in her hand started lengthening, and she turned it to the ground. As soon as the sharp tip hit the ground it stopped growing and she started walking, using the piece as a walking stick.

Nathan laughed and held out his hand, saying "Let me see that." Elsa tossed the long piece of ice to Nathan, who caught it nimbly in one hand and started examining it. The ice was, as nearly as he could tell, flawless. There was not a single bump on the surface or air bubble on the inside. He struck the point of the stick onto the ground and paid special attention to the vibrations that shook through the piece of ice. He was surprised at how much force the ice was able to absorb.

An idea popped into Nathan's head, and he asked "What else can you make like this?"

Elsa shrugged and asked "What do you have in mind?"

Nathan shrugged and drew his sword. "Something like this." He said and held the blade out by the handle so that she could see the blade easily. She motioned for him to hand her the shard of ice and he did. She took the shard in her hand and started running her hand down the shard while looking at the blade. Every time her hand passed over the spike of ice small dents and divots appeared. A few moments after this large pieces started falling off the main shard. She stopped and looked at the shard of ice disappointedly. Nathan could see the basic shape of something that might be a blade, with a little bit of imagination. He took the messily shaped ice blade by the hilt and tested the weighting of the thing. It was weighted about as well as it was shaped, he found, with a blade that was at least three times heavier than the handle.

Elsa sighed disappointedly and Nathan looked over at her. She was looking sadly between the real blade and the ice blade. Nathan dropped the ice blade to the ground casually and said "So making swords isn't your strong suit. So what? I'll bet you've got tones of other tricks up your sleeves." Encouragingly, sheathing his blade.

Elsa looked at him, thinking, than a smile exploded on her face. "I've got something!" she said excitedly and took a few quick steps away from Nathan. Nathan smiled and crossed his arms, waiting to see what she had in store.

She flicked her wrists towards the ground and let a large amount of energy flow through her. The magic struck the ground and where it did, snow started swirling and assembling into one massive form. Nathan heard Anna gasp from her seat by the door and get up nervously. He spread his legs to a more combative stance and readied his sword.

The swirling pieces of snow and ice assembled into a large humanoid figure. Behind it was Elsa, who looked up at the thing and laughed, like she was unsure of her ability to make the thing. Nathan looked worriedly at Elsa. She looked back with a mischievous smile at him and shouted playfully over the sudden rush of air around the thing "Are you good to fight this? Because I kind of want to see you fight it." She paused for a second and said "Now you need to show me your powers!"

Nathan gave Elsa a wolfish grin and readied himself completely for combat. He looked at the giant with a critical eye. Most of its joints were covered in ice, which he was almost sure wouldn't break with just a single blow. Its fingers were also made of ice, and seemed to go deep into the stumps Nathan would call hands, which would suggest to him that the whole thing had some kind of ice-skeleton. Overall he was confident he would be able to take the thing down, but he would have to be careful to avoid being hit, as it probably hit like a battering ram.

The golem, as Nathan decided to call it, opened its mouth and roared at him. Snowflakes and small fragments of ice were shot out of its mouth, forcing Nathan to bring his left hand in front of his face while keeping his sword ready in his right.

The golem charged at him, extending its arms in a grabbing motion. Nathan lowered his arm and saw the giant barreling towards him. He pushed off the ground as hard as he could, and an unnatural wind blew him up into the air. The golem didn't stop its charge when he left the ground, so as he came back down the golem ran under him and he came down right on the beasts shoulder. He wasted no time in plunging his blade into the ice-protected joint of its arm, the blade penetrating the armor with a loud chink.

The golem roared and grabbed at him. He tried to avoid the grasp of the thing but one icy finger caught his coat. It was all he could do to keep his grip on his blade as the golem pulled him off. The blade left its shoulder with a painful sounding grinding noise and it roared again as it flung Nathan across the courtyard.

Nathan focused and pooled his energy. The roar stopped abruptly and he stopped flying through the air, suspended in time. He cast his focus to the ground below him, a good distance from the golem. He pulsed his energy and braced his legs as they were suddenly reunited with the ground. He slid backwards from the golem about half a foot even with his surefooted charm before he stopped himself.

As soon as Nathan stopped, the golem launched into another charge. It moved at him with speed Nathan would think was impossible for such a huge thing. Instead of jumping as he had last time, he decided to do something else. He drew back his sword and readied a strike while at the same time focusing on a point next to the golem's leg. He pulsed his power and brought his blade down with all the strength he could. Just as his blink brought him to the monsters side, he brought his blade through the monsters leg. He felt the resistance of the ice inside the beast push against his blade, but it wasn't enough.

The golem roared in surprise as its leg stopped supporting it during its charge. It crashed to the ground, and Nathan relaxed, dropping his blade from a ready position to his side. Surely it was too damaged from the fall to continue fighting, right?

Only a second after it stopped moving its great arms started flailing around again. Its huge icy fingers dug into the cobblestone as it turned its massive body to face Nathan again. He tightened his grip on the hilt of his blade and brought it back to a fighting stance.

The golem seemed to be fighting defensively now, waiting for Nathan to attack it. It lay there on the ground glaring daggers into Nathan with its empty eye sockets. Nathan paced slowly in a circle around it like a wolf around trapped prey. He looked for an opening, any opening that would allow him to get in and strike a killing blow.

The golem kept itself covered well, using its massive arms as walls to block off any attack path Nathan could have taken. He thought about using the small crossbow on his belt, but he doubted the affectivity that such an attack would have.

Nathan glanced over at Elsa. She was standing of to the side now, closer to the wall now than the center of the courtyard. She was looking on with an expression on her face that was about half an impressed smile and half a worried frown. Nathan looked at Anna, who was peeking out from behind a wooden pillar, still by the stairs of the door.

The golem seemed to realize that Nathan was not giving it his full attention and decided to take a swing at him. Nathan flung himself straight back, again pushed by an unnatural wind. As he danced back the golem dug its fingers into the cobblestone again and pulled itself after him.

The golem pulled an arm back, preparing another strike. Nathan saw his opportunity and focused. He blinked to a point just behind and above the golems arm. As he pulsed his energy he drew his blade up for another strike. As he fell the short distance to the ground he angled himself in the air so that he could bring his blade down on the golem's arm.

His blade cleaved through the arm with ease this time, his blade aided by the force of his fall, steel clanging against the stone under the arm. The arm that Nathan had chosen to cut off was the one that the golem was swinging at him, so when the arm was severed from the body it went sliding off to the side, almost smashing into the place Anna was hiding.

Nathan looked over quickly at Elsa. She looked concerned and like she was about to step in and end the fight. Nathan figured it was time to end this little spat.

He was about at what would be the golem's ribs, and he wanted to get to the head. The golem started flailing and shouting in rage. Nathan focused on a spot right next to the golems head and pulsed his power. He turned and found the golems head roaring, shooting shards of ice and flakes of snow into his face. He raised his blade over his head and flipped the hilt in his hand so the blade was point down. He brought the point of the blade down as hard as he could into the golem's forehead.

The golem stopped roaring. Nathan looked back at the golem and relaxed his grip on the blade. The entire golem was beginning to crumble into one big pile of powdery snow with a few thick tree trunk-like ice bones poking out.

Nathan didn't hear Elsa approach, but as he turned back to face where she had been standing he found himself face to face with her. She was looking concernedly from the dead snow pile to Nathan and back again.

Nathan suddenly felt the eyes of everyone bearing down on him. Even the guards on the walls had stopped what they had been doing to watch Nathans battle. Elsa put a hand on his shoulder and he had to resist the instant urge to jerk away. "Are you alright?" Elsa was obviously concerned.

Nathan smiled awkwardly and said "What, didn't think I could handle myself?"

Elsa shook her head and said "Not in such a…" she searched for the word.

Nathan interjected with a word that might fit. "Spectacular?"

She pointed at him and said "Such a spectacular way. Thank you." She laughed a little bit and smiled at him.

Nathan stepped back from Elsa, trying to get her hand off of him. He got far enough that Elsa's hand dropped back to her side, but he felt something push against his back. He jumped to the side and turned to face the new thing and found it was Anna standing behind him.

She was looking him over up and down, asking "Are you hurt? Are you ok? How did you do that, it was-"

Elsa cut her off, putting a hand on her shoulder and pushing her away slightly saying "Give him some room, Anna."

Nathan looked around skittishly and asked "So are we done?"

Elsa nodded. "You did…" she paused and looked at the pile of snow that used to be a golem "…much better than I expected." She looked back to Nathan and made to touch his arm again. "You're sure you're alright?"

Nathan retreated from her touch, not enough to take a step back, but enough to make clear he didn't want to be touched. "Yes." He said in a slightly exasperated voice "I'm sure I'm fine." He shrugged and said "Even if I was hurt, so what? It was just a little exercise, right?"

Elsa looked down at the ground and said "I just want to be sure I didn't hurt you."

Nathan said in his best reassuring tone "Well I am sure you didn't hurt me. Even if the golem had, say, broken something, it wouldn't be your fault. You don't control the thing directly, so why would I blame you?" Nathan made a mental note that Elsa still had some insecurities regarding her powers.

Anna turned to Elsa, saying "Yea, if that thing hurt him it wouldn't be your fault!"

Elsa looked up from one to the other. "You… really feel that way?" both Anna and Nathan nodded. Elsa smiled weakly and her eyes started to tear up. Nathan another intimate moment looming over him and stepped back from the two sisters. Thankfully for him, Elsa took a deep breath, steeling herself against the wave of emotions she was apparently feeling. She let out the deep breath and sighed.

Anna was the first to speak after this. She spoke in her usual chipper voice, saying "So are we just going to stand out here and freeze? Let's go inside, shall we?"

This snapped Elsa back into the situation at hand. She looked up from her thoughts, shook her head clear, and said "Yes," and turned to Nathan. "let's get out of the cold, shall we?"

Nathan nodded and motioned for them to lead the way. The trio walked silently through the halls of the castle. It wasn't an awkward silence, like no one wanted to speak, but rather a contented silence, as there was nothing to say. Nathan didn't know where they were going but he followed anyways, not particularly caring where they went.

Something he found that he had to watch out for was the long crystalline cape that trailed off of Elsa's dress. Several times he nearly stepped on it, but he was able to avoid causing any problems with it. This did, however, bring Elsa's dress to his attention. It was something that he had overlooked up until now. It seemed to be made of small shards of ice, all woven together and bound intricately in patterns Nathan could hardly keep track of. The entire thing, even the sleeves were made from this woven ice. Elsa seemed to move freely in the thing. Nathan would have thought that the shards would slice through her skin like glass, but this seemed to be far from the truth. Now that he looked, even her shoes were made from ice. Even the small ringlet at the end of the intricately woven braid was made of ice. He noted how the light of candles they passed as they walked reflected off of the crystalline dress and cast an orange light off in hundreds of reflections, when it was dark enough to see them.

He wondered if this was how she clothed herself every day, or if today was something special. He though back to the first time he had seen her, at the party. It seemed so long ago, but he was certain she was wearing the same thing she was now. He thought about what it would look like if he garbed himself in his power, shadow. He snorted and smiled to himself as he realized he had done that, in a way, many times. It made patrolling guards walk past him without a second thought, and even the most attentive lookout pass him over as just a sign of missing sleep. He had never actually used his power to cover himself in shadow, he had always covered areas than traveled through the darkened place.

Anna looked back and saw him examining the back of Elsa's dress. He didn't pay her much mind until he saw her wiggling her eyebrows at him and smirking. He gave her a puzzled look before realizing what her antics probably meant. He felt his cheeks start burning as he averted his gaze to the floor. Anna giggled and turned back to face the way she was walking.

Elsa heard Anna laugh and turned to look at Nathan. He looked back at Elsa awkwardly and shrugged unconvincingly. Anna snickered even harder at this, causing Nathan to drop his gaze to the floor again and to keep it there stubbornly.

The rest of the walk was passed in complete silence. The three approached a large ornate door. Anna pushed it open and walked in. Nathan and Elsa followed Anna into the room, finding themselves in a large lushly decorated room with massive shelves at least three times Nathans height, all covered in books. Nathan looked around and asked Elsa "A library?"

She looked back at him and nodded, saying "Me and Anna always meet in here when I've no royal duties in the afternoon."

Nathan nodded and continued following her in.


	10. Chapter 10

Nathan, Elsa and Anna spent several hours in the library, just lounging around, reading and talking. After about an hour the conversation turned from random topics like favorite colors or seasons, to powers and magic. Elsa was the first to bring the topic up.

She looked up to Nathan from a book in her lap and addressed him. "Hey, Nathan?"

He peaked out from behind a bookshelf and called back "Yea?"

Elsa beckoned to him and said "come here."

Nathan walked out from behind the bookshelf and blinked right in front of her. She gave a little yelp and jumped, but then smiled mischievously at Nathan. "I'll get you back for that." She said in a mock-threatening tone.

Nathan waved a hand dismissively and said "of course you will." In a sarcastic tone.

From somewhere in the rows of bookshelves Anna's voice rang out. "She's not joking, she's going to get you!"

Nathan threw his head up and turned to the shelves, shouting to Anna. "Yea, I'm quaking in my boots right now!"

Elsa smirked, already planning her revenge. But that wasn't why she called him over. She had serious questions she wanted to ask him. She motioned to a chair across from her and said "Please, sit."

Nathan raised an eyebrow and said "Just after you threaten me?" He turned and looked at the chair inspecting it for signs of sabotage. He didn't see any telltale signs of a trap, but he was still hesitant to sit.

Elsa rolled her eyes and said exasperatedly "I didn't do anything to the chair." Nathan shrugged and sat down slowly. When he settled into the chair he gave it a few experimental shakes than seemed satisfied. He looked up at Elsa expectantly. "I wanted to ask you" she said "about your powers." She watched Nathan's face carefully. When she mentioned his powers the joking look on his face faded and were replaced by a business like visage. He sat up straighter in his chair and focused more on Elsa.

She took a deep breath and readied herself. Something about the way he reacted set her on edge. She continued, "What does it feel like when you use your power?"

Nathan thought for a moment. Did he trust Elsa enough to tell her this? Yes, he didn't have much choice there. He had already pledged himself to her, so he had already sort of made that decision. He would tell her about her powers, but he wouldn't have to go into detail. Something that he had been wondering himself, though, would help him explain it to her. "Well… what does It feel like for you? What do you do that starts a spell?"

Elsa held a hand up to her eyes and summoned a small blast of cold air, blowing several snowflakes towards the ceiling. She did it again and focused on what made it happen. It was a thought, a will to make it happen. "It's… it's like my…" she shook her head, trying to put the feeling into words. "…my wanting to make it happen and… and my belief, my thought, just… makes it happen." She looked at Nathan to see if he understood.

Nathan nodded. There was a feeling of dread somewhere deep in his chest. It didn't come from any real discernable source, but Nathan defiantly felt… intimidated by what she said. She hadn't said anything about her power tiring her out. If what she said was true, than her powers were not limited by any raw power restrictions. She could use her powers without limitation, as if it were her heart beating. Knowing that such a person even existed was scary. It was as if someone had a crossbow aimed at his head and Nathan didn't know where the bow was.

He took a deep breath and reminded himself that he was in her service, not her enemy. As long as it stayed that way he would have nothing to fear. He turned his thoughts instead to his own powers. "I have a much more… controlled way to use my powers. It's like my powers are another limb, I use them in much the same way. And, as if my power was a limb, it can tire and fail if put under enough pressure." He took a bone charm from one of his pockets and started working it in his hands. "But those are just the powers I use." Elsa gave him a confused look. He explained "My powers give me other benefits, ones I don't have to expend energy to use." He thought back to the fight with the golem looking for an example. "Like… like when I jumped onto the golem you summoned. That jump didn't take energy. The magic I have just pushed me into the air."

Elsa thought back and said "And when you dodged his swipe?"

Nathan nodded. "I was being pushed by my power." He hesitated. "Well, my power strengthened what I was doing." He didn't want to make it seem like he had control issues. "And the same goes for my health. I'm pretty resilient to getting sick, and…" He snorted, remembering a few fights from his childhood "…I can take a hell of a beating."

Elsa nodded and said "Wow, that's incredible. I sort of wish I had things that just… happened like that." She thought back to the first time she had ever fought with her powers. "I mean, I've done things like stop an arrow, but it was a more reaction kind of thing, it didn't just happen."

Nathan shrugged. "Well, I have to want to do it, it doesn't just happen from nowhere. All my other powers use up my energy."

Elsa looked at him, puzzled. He clarified "After I use my powers a lot I can get too tired to keep using them. There are some things I can do to keep from running out altogether, but I prefer to just not burn too much energy."

Elsa nodded. She understood, at least, better than she had before. Another thing she had been wondering popped into her mind, and she asked "Were you born with your powers?"

Nathan shook his head and said "No, I got them when I was…" he realized he didn't actually know how old he had been when he got them. It didn't bother him, it was just strange to think about. He decided to guess. "… probably about ten or eleven."

Elsa leaned forward at this. "Really? How did you get them?" she asked incredulously.

Nathan sighed. He considered showing her the mark emblazoned on the back of his left hand. He didn't particularly want to, but at this point there wasn't much harm it could do considering everything else he had told her.

He peeled off the elbow length leather glove and turned the back of his hand to Elsa. She took his hand and examined the mark carefully. As she did Nathan said "It was given to me by the Outsider." He stopped and asked "You… do know the Outsider, right?" Elsa nodded and he continued. "I got pretty messed up in a fight with some older kids. While I was unconscious the Outsider appeared to me and told me that he would give me some of his power. I woke up with that-"he indicated the mark on his hand "- and I've have had the power ever since."

Elsa let go of his hand and gasped. "You were fighting when you were ten?" she said worriedly. "Why didn't your parents stop you?"

Nathan laughed at this. It was a genuine laugh, but it came out sounding bitter. "My parents were long dead by the time this fight happened. And I was fighting long before ten, I was losing a lot up until ten."

Elsa looked cringed and looked down. "I… I'm sorry. I didn't-"

Nathan cut her off with a dismissive wave of his hand. "Don't be, I'm glad they weren't around." He assured her.

She looked at him sympathetically and said "But… but who took care of you?"

Nathan figured that all caution may as well just be thrown to the wind at this point. "I stayed at an orphanage for a while. It didn't have much money, so not all the kids got food. I tried to help out by stealing from shops around town."

He paused for breath, Elsa nodded and said "Anna told me about that. You started stealing jewelry and stuff after a while."

Nathan smiled. "News spreads fast among siblings, eh?"

Elsa smiled and nodded, saying "Very."

Nathan chuckled and said "Whatever, after a while I was raking in more money than the orphanage needed. To feed the kids, at least. I started setting some of the money aside and buying gear for myself and some other kid who helped me on jobs." He paused, thinking. "I… can't seem to remember his name, though." He rested his chin on his knuckles and said "Huh… I can't remember his name at all." He dismissed the thought and continued. "Anyways, I bought us gear. You know, shoes, gloves, lock picks, rope, whatever we needed to get more stuff. Me and him were the ones who took care of the other kids. He was the one who dealt with them personally, and I was the one who got most of the food."

It was strange, telling his story to someone else. He used spent most of his time alone, so he had had a lot of time to think about what happened to him. Telling the story to another person gave it perspective. He didn't think he had a sad past, but Elsa's reactions to what he said were what he would expect if he was telling her some sob story.

Elsa looked at him sadly. Nathan saw something new in her eyes, something he wasn't used too. Pity, he realized, was what he saw. He felt strange, knowing someone actually felt bad for him. He didn't like it. He didn't want her thinking less of him or looking down at him.

He started to speak, but the sound caught in his throat, resulting in a strangled gurgling noise. Elsa looked at him worriedly as he cleared his throat and beat his chest. He felt his cheeks burn red again as he slid his hand back into his glove and tried again, wondering why his voice caught. "It's not bad, it just happened."

Elsa looked him in the eyes and said incredulously "Not that bad? But you… you must have needed a parent at some point! What kind of childhood is having to care for an orphanage full of other kids?" she looked at him sadly again "you must not have had a childhood at all."

Nathan felt like he needed to change the mood at this point. He gave Elsa a joking smile and said "or maybe I'm still living it."

Her reaction wasn't exactly the laughter he had been hoping for, but he would take the small smile he got. He stood from the chair, feeling the conversation was over. He turned and started to walk back to the bookshelves, looking over his shoulder at Elsa. She was gazing back down at the book in her lap. He could tell that she wasn't reading it, though, as her eyes were glazed over and not moving.

…..

It was about half an hour later when Nathan found himself laying on top on one of the bookshelves, holding a small leather-bound medical journal over his head reading. He was reading a fascinating study on the spread of diseases, something that he had always been semi-interested in. He liked to think that if he hadn't gotten the Outsider's mark that he would have grown to be some kind of doctor or surgeon. He had always had a precision with blades and a disregard for blood, both things he thought would help in a surgery.

He turned the page and found a small sketch of a hand that detailed all the various muscles and tendons. Next to it was a sketch with the same hand but with considerable damage, with the muscles withering away. A small paragraph next to the second sketch said that the drawing was of the hand of a sick man who had agreed to let the doctor study the damage that a sickness caused his body.

Nathan held up his own hand next to the sketch and wondered what it would feel like to be reduced to such a state. He clenched his fist and felt the muscles pull taught. After a moment he unclenched his fist and shook his head, dismissing the thought. He turned the page again and found two more sketches, both of faces. One was of a healthy enough looking face, the other of a face sunken in and covered in boils and sores. An accompanying paragraph described the development of the sickness as frighteningly quick, but the nature of the disease to be not contagious.

He was about to turn the page again when he heard hushed whispering. He looked to where Elsa had been sitting when he last talked to her and found her gone. He gazed around the room, looking over many tables, chairs, and bookshelves but didn't see her or Anna anywhere. The whispering continued, and Nathan set the journal down. He stood from the flat position he had been in and looked around again.

Still, he saw nothing. He felt like he should find them. It seemed the proper thing to do, him being the bodyguard and all. He blinked to the next bookshelf over and looked over the side, searching for the two women. He did this twice more but did not find them.

He stopped and knelt down, listening intently to the whispering, trying to locate it. The library was large and furnished well, leaving hundreds of small echoes bouncing around to confuse him. He closed his eyes and focused, letting his power leak out slowly into the shadows of the room. He felt the shadows of the books, shelves, and other furnishings all static and unmoving. He also felt the movement of people. Human shadows, moving around as if talking.

He stood and turned to the direction of the shadows. They were on the other side of the room in-between two shelves. The bookshelf closest to him was just within blinking range, luckily enough. He focused and blinked onto the top of it, crouching down and taking care to make his footfalls as quiet as possible. He crept closer to the pair to better her what they were saying.

As he came into earshot the whispers started to form real words and sentences. He stopped moving and knelt down on one knee, listening intensely.

"... just feel bad for him, that's all." That was defiantly Elsa's voice. He felt a twinge of annoyance that she was still pitying him.

Anna spoke next "I know, so do I. But he wants to help!"

Elsa sighed. "I know, but my advisors made it very clear I was making a mistake."

Anna spoke again sounding exasperated "They were also going to let Hans kill you! Elsa, why do you keep them around now? You handle almost everything anyways, and you always say how much you hate them, so why keep them?"

Elsa spoke softly now. "Mama and Papa told me to trust them."

There was a moment of silence between the two. Nathan had to doubt the wisdom of Elsa's and Anna's parents if they had said that to their own children. They should have known that on matter how much they trusted their own advisors. They shouldn't let their children trust them like that. Not without some basis for the trust, and their word wasn't enough.

Anna broke the silence. "Well… I'm starting to doubt that you should. Maybe Mama and Papa trusted them, but I think they've changed since the accident."

Nathan heard footsteps and knew by the sound that it was Elsa walking. She walked to the other end of the bookshelf and Nathan followed from above. Anna rushed to follow behind her.

Elsa stopped and turned sharply at the end of the shelf to Anna, saying "You think I don't know that? They were telling me to declare a war today, Anna! A war!" she took a deep breath, calmed herself, and continued. "Sorry…I… I haven't been sleeping well. I think I'm going to seek out some new advisors."

Nathan heard both Anna and Elsa gasp at the same time. He peered over the side of the bookshelf and saw what they were gasping about.

A thin layer of frost had started to creep out from Elsa's feet, covering the floor around her and starting to work up the side of the bookshelf. Anna and Elsa were looking at it with shocked expressions. Nathan felt the dread he had felt earlier return. Elsa closed her eyes and scrunched her face up, obviously trying very hard to do something. After a few moments of this the frost receded back across the floor and back to her feet.

Nathan was starting to feel bad about listening in on a private conversation. He crept back across the top of the bookshelf and dropped back to the floor silently. He stepped out into the row of book that they were in and announced himself by clearing his throat loudly and saying "Ah, there you are, I was looking for you."

Both of them looked at Nathan, surprised by his sudden appearance. They both took a step back from him and readjusted themselves quickly so they looked more comfortable than they really were. Nathan raised his hands apologetically and said "Did… I interrupt something?"

They both looked at each other uncomfortably, Elsa turned back to Nathan and said "No, no you didn't interrupt anything. We were just… talking."

Nathan gave her a sympathetic smile and said "You're a bad liar, Elsa." He shrugged and turned to fake examine the books lined up on the bookshelf, saying in a playful voice "I guess me Eavesdropping didn't hurt either."

Anna gasped and said "You were listening to us?" indignantly.

Nathan picked a book off the shelf at random and turned it over to look at the cover. He snorted to himself when he saw the title, and he read it out loud. "The Tales of Flynnigan Ryder. I remember this book from when I was a kid."

Anna stepped forwards and pushed the book back towards the shelf, looking Nathan in the face. "How much did you hear?"

Nathan put the book back on the shelf and took a step back from Anna. "Something about advisors giving… bad advice." He said nonchalantly.

Elsa was the next to speak, saying "Nathan, I would prefer it if you would make your presence known if you find a conversation in progress." In an official, stately manner. Nathan could tell that this was not something that she took lightly.

He put his left hand across his chest and closed his hand, so that his fist was over his heart. He bowed to Elsa and said in a very respectful tone, much different from the way he was speaking prior "Of course, Queen." She regarded his bow with a strange look, something that Nathan was used to. It was a gesture of respect was something Nathan had always used, but couldn't remember where he had seen it used.

Elsa bowed her head and said "Thank you." In an equally respectful tone.

Nathan rose from his bow and again took the book from the shelf. He opened the cover of the book and looked at the intricately written title. While looking at it, he said "So, what's to be done with the wolves?" remembering how Elsa had described them earlier.

He heard Elsa sigh, but he didn't look up from the book. There was a pause in which he could hear her breathing get ever so slightly heavier. "I…. I will speak to them, and if they refuse changing their ways…" she took another deep breath "… than they will be replaced."

Nathan turned the page to the first chapter in the book, saying darkly "And if they refuse replacement?"

Nathan heard Anna's footsteps bring her up next to Elsa. "They won't refuse." she said in an unusually dark way for her normally happy sounding voice. Nathan looked up and saw Anna with a hand on Elsa's shoulder trying to comfort her.

He didn't know if he should also try and console her or whether he should leave that up to Anna. He decided that he may as well try. "In my experience…" he spoke slowly, choosing his wording carefully "… when the advisors go bad, it's… like…" his mind raced to come up with a comparison "… ingredients in a kitchen going bad." He paused, going over the comparison in his head and shrugged. It worked. "You can keep cooking with the bad stuff, but nothing you make will be as good as it could be."

Elsa looked down, thinking. After a moment she said "I'm going to tell them tonight. I want you-" she looked from Nathan to Anna "-both of you there when I do."

Anna looked worriedly at her and asked "do you think something is going to happen?"

Nathan nodded and looked to Elsa, also curious if she was anticipating trouble.

She shook her head and said "I don't know… I'd just rather play it safe."

Nathan closed the book and put it under his arm, intending to read it later. He asked Elsa "About when do you think you're going to talk to them?"

She started massaging her temples, even despite the bone charm still around her neck. "I don't know… after dinner, I suppose."

Nathan nodded in agreement and glanced around the huge room for a clock or some other method of telling time. Finding nothing, he asked "what time is it, by the way?" to no one in particular.

Anna looked at him and shrugged, saying "I don't know, but dinner is in about an hour."

…

The hour passed excruciatingly slow for Nathan. He spent most of it sprawled out on top of a bookshelf reading the story book "_Tales of Flynnigan Ryder_". He didn't particularly care for the story itself, but reading it brought memories of when he was a child back. Most people wouldn't want to remember a childhood like he had, but he enjoyed looking back on it and seeing how far he had come.

It seemed like thousands of years ago when he had been huddled around a fire with a group of other kids, all trying to stave off the chilling wind that wormed its way through even the thickest walls of the orphanage. One of the older kids read from a book, _The Tales of Flynnigan Rider_, trying to distract the other kids from the miserable conditions. It never worked for Nathan, but that didn't stop him from listening.

After a few chapters Nathan heard a voice that snapped him out of him memories. Anna called to him from the ground "Nathan, come on, dinner time!"

He put the book down on the bookshelf and dropped from the top. He hit the ground lightly and stood up, stretching his back. Anna looked at him, shocked. He motioned to the door and said "Well? Let's go."

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Authors thing:

WOO, double digits!  
so other than that, would anyone mind if i brought some tangled stuff into the mix? cuz that's kind of what I've been planing.

thanks for reading my stuff, I'll just keep posting i guess.


	11. Chapter 11

The trio walked into the dining hall and started to collect their food. The food that they got was essentially the same as what they had gotten during lunch, with the exception of Elsa getting far less food than she normally would, as opposed to the mountain of food she had during lunch.

As they approached an empty table several of Elsa's advisors approached them. Nathan and Elsa stopped dead in their tracks while Anna just kept walking, not realizing that the others had stopped. The advisors were grinning at each other like there was some joke between them.

Nathan didn't like them. He didn't like the way they carried themselves, he didn't like the way they looked at him, he didn't like the way they talked, and he didn't like them. Maybe they reminded him of the people who used to hire him, maybe he just didn't like them. He couldn't entirely tell which it was, but the feeling was defiantly there.

One of the larger men bowed to Elsa and said "My queen" in an almost mock-respectful tone. He rose from his bow and looked at Nathan distastefully. Nathan returned his look with as aggressive a glare as he could muster.

The man looked back to Elsa and said "My queen, there is something we would like to speak to you about." He looked Nathan right in the eyes "In private." And he motioned to the other side of the room, indicating a table at which sat a few more advisors.

Elsa hesitated, looking from Anna to Nathan to the table. After a few moments of consideration she gave a defeated sigh. "Nathan, just go eat with Anna." and she turned to walk to the table of advisors.

Nathan was about to speak against Elsa being commandeered by the men, but thought better of it. He her would watch from his table, and if they left the hall he would follow. He stalked unhappily to the table Anna was seated at and sat next to her. She looked from him to Elsa, and back again. "Is that it? You're just going to let them take her?" she asked in a puzzled and slightly indignant voice.

Nathan nodded solemnly and started digging into his food, looking up through his hair, fixing his gaze on Elsa at the far table. He separated himself from his food and said "They can't do anything against her, not here, not in front of so many people. If they leave I'll follow." Anna nodded and started eating. What Nathan said didn't lay her fears to rest, but they did comfort her knowing that Nathan would keep a constant watch.

The meal passed in silence. Nathan ate his food quickly and pushed his plate across the table away from him, sitting and waiting for something to happen at Elsa's table. Anna ate much slower than Nathan. She didn't know how he could stand eating with Elsa being so close to those she said she was afraid of. Eventually even Anna finished her meal. Elsa was engaged in a heated argument with her advisors, all of whom were smirking and smiling at each other in the same way they had that had made Nathan feel aggression building just by watching them.

Elsa, from what Nathan could tell, had similar feelings. As she argued with them her movements became much more animated and wild as she gestured around at things Nathan couldn't see. Her face grew more and more red and her expression gradually turned to an almost beast-like snarl. And through all this the men just sat, speaking calmly to one another and laughing. Nathan had never cared much for the formalities that royals usually insisted on, such as demanding they be called a certain name or demanding that other bow in their presence, but their blatant lack of respect for Elsa only infuriated him further.

At long last Elsa stood from the table and began stomping her way towards Nathan's and Anna's table. When she reached the table both stood and looked at her questioningly, wondering what they could have said that would infuriate Elsa so much. Wordlessly Elsa motioned for them to follow her, and she stomped her way out of the hall. Nathan and Anna looked at each other hesitantly before following.

When they reached the halls Elsa kept walking about another half a minute before she just stopped, breathing heavily. Anna put her hand gently on her shoulder and said "Elsa… are you o-ok?"

Elsa turned on her heels quickly, bringing her to face Anna. Anna took a fearful step back from Elsa and hid behind Nathan, who stood stock-still. Elsa looked completely enraged. Her normally calm face was contorted by anger, making her look like some kind of beast. Anna whimpered something from behind Nathan that nobody could make out.

Elsa's breathing lightened and her face fell. Nathan could see tears welling up in her eyes and her body start to shudder. Her knees started to shake and she brought her hands to her eyes. She started to drop, and Nathan lurched forwards to catch her by the shoulders. He stopped her from hitting the ground and set her down gently. He looked back at Anna with a concerned look on his face, and Anna came forwards to help.

"Elsa? Elsa it's… It's ok. What's wrong, Elsa?" Anna was looking Elsa over with a frantic demeanor asking "What's wrong? What's wrong?" over and over again. Elsa embraced Anna and started weeping into her shoulder. Nathan looked around them, making sure there was no one watching them. He didn't find anyone so he turned his focus back to the sisters on the ground.

Elsa stood, and her weeping got lighter. She said to Anna "T-they told me…" she choked back another sob and continued "I-if I didn't d-do what they said that t-they would…" she looked at Nathan with big, desperate eyes. "We ha-have to…"

Nathan nodded. He helped Elsa to her feet and said "I want you to come too." Elsa looked at him and nodded, steeling herself against the storm of emotion she felt and her crying subsided. Nathan put a hand on her back and said "Where would they be now?"

Elsa took the lead again. She walked unsteadily with Anna under her arm providing support. They walked for several minutes before coming to a stop in front of a small door. Elsa turned to Nathan and pointed to the door, saying "they're in there." In an anxious voice. Nathan put his eye to the lock on the door and strained to see what was inside.

It was a scene right out of many of his assassination jobs, with about seven rich looking men sitting around a table with drinks in their hands. Nathan didn't see any weapons among them, so he was confident in his ability to intimidate them and, if it came down to it, take them down. Part of him hoped that he would have an excuse to kill them.

He pulled away from the door and looked back to Elsa and Anna. He motioned for Elsa to go in first, saying "You have to talk to them first, I can't do anything until they do something."

Elsa nodded silently and went to open the door. She tried to turn the handle, but found it stuck firmly in place. She took a step back and tried again, throwing her weight against the door. It still refused to budge.

Nathan stepped forwards, about to offer o kick the door down but before he could, Elsa put a hand to the lock. Frost formed over the top of the lock, and Nathan was sure there was more on the inside. Elsa jerked the handle down. The sound of the tumblers in the lock shattering was surprisingly loud.

Elsa swung the door open and didn't even flinch as it hit the wall with a loud crash. She strode in confidently and shouted to the room "Hello, gentlemen!"

Nathan was a bit taken aback by the sudden change in Elsa's demeanor. First she's going berserk, than terrified, now she's confident? He grew more and more suspicious of the advisors every moment.

Elsa entered into the room and as soon as her foot fell onto the floor, frost started spreading over the floor and creeping up the furniture of the room. Two of the men rose from their seats and started to walk towards Elsa, but stopped abruptly. Nathan was puzzled as to why they stopped, than he looked at the floor. The frost had moved over their feet and was holding them in place.

He thought about stepping forward and pointing this out to Elsa, but she had already started speaking. "As some of you may know-" she glared daggers at the seated four "-I have been under a lot of pressure as of late."

One of the four men still seated interrupted her, saying "Ah, excellent my queen. Would you care to join us for a drink?" he poured a new glass of what looked to Nathan like brandy and offered it to the queen. Nathan almost missed it, but h saw the man dip a finger into the drink before holding it out.

Nathan had never been poisoned, but he had poisoned a fair number of people over the course of his contracts, and that finger was a definite red flag. He glanced at Elsa, concerned she might not have seen the motion.

Elsa took the glass from the man and held it to her nose, smelling it. Her face scrunched up and she held the glass away from her. The liquid inside the glass froze solid and she dropped it. The glass skittered across the floor and came to rest under some off piece of furniture. Elsa ignored the glass and looked at the man who handed it to her.

She said angrily "Do you take me for a fool, Tillman?"

The man looked confusedly at Elsa and said "No… my lady, what's troubling you?" he tried to stand, but found himself frozen to the cushioned couch he was sitting on. He looked angry now, and asked "Why are you doing this, my lady?" sounding frustrated.

Elsa threw an arm towards the man and a spike of ice shot out of the floor, stopping just short of the man's throat. "I think you know exactly what I'm talking about, Mr. Tillman. I'm talking about what you've been doing the past weeks."

The man reeled back in his seat away from the spike and shouted in a panicked voice "Queen, please! I don't know what you're talking about!"

Nathan stepped forward and put a hand on Elsa's shoulder. He felt like he had to intervene here. She wasn't talking to the man, she was just threatening him. "Elsa, perhaps you should…" he paused a second and thought "… speak your reasons for this. Give him the option to leave, perhaps."

Elsa looked over her shoulder at him and her face fell. It was like she realized she was doing something very bad. Nathan saw something in her eyes that he saw a lot in the eyes of his targets. Shame. She felt bad for what she had done so far. She lowered her arm and the spike retracted back into the floor. The man looked frightened in-between the two and said "What's the meaning of this?"

He strained against the ice that bound him to his seat, and after a moment the ice gave with a crack. He stood and took a step towards Elsa. He spoke softly as he went, saying "My queen, can you not see?" he motioned towards Nathan "He is using you." Nathan noticed an acrid smell start spreading through the room. "He is manipulating you, like a puppet!" Elsa's eyes widened and she turned back to Nathan with a distrusting look.

Anna chose this time to interject. She spoke first from behind Nathan, saying "Elsa, are you really listening to him? We came here to get rid of him!" she pushed her way past Nathan and entered into the room. She grabbed Elsa by the arms and looked straight into her eyes. "Elsa, Elsa please! You have to snap out of it!"

She turned to Nathan and said desperately "We talked about this. They do this! They try and-" Anna's eyes rolled back in her head and she fell to the floor, limp.

The man, apparently called Tillman, pointed at Anna than at Nathan, whispering to Elsa "See? He has knocked her out! Will you allow this to happen?"

Elsa put a hand to her temple and said confusedly "No… I… I can't…"

Now Nathan saw the picture. The men were manipulating her, bewitching her into doing whatever they wanted. He drew his sword and stepped forward, past Elsa and over Anna, placing himself between them. "Why don't you just leave?" he said gravely and tilted his head motioning to the door.

The man laughed. It was a deep bellowing laugh that bounced off the walls of the room. The men still sitting and the two men standing looked at the man uncomfortably. He drew back a fist and threw a punch at Nathan. Nathan leaned back and avoided the punch with less than an inch between the fist and his face.

Nathan straightened back out and swiped at the man with his blade. The man moved out of the way of his blade with a strange nimbleness. It was like his entire body contorted away from the blade that would've raked a deep gash across his chest, as if the man could move his chest just like he could his arms.

Nathan saw his blade missed and took a cautionary jump back. He accidentally slammed his back into Elsa, still standing behind him, sending her to the ground. He wanted to help her, but didn't want to take his focus off the man in front of him.

The man opened his mouth and bellowed a loud booming shout. At the same time a sickly green gas started shooting from his mouth. His hit Nathan straight in the face, and he inhaled a lungful of the stuff. He instantly dropped to one knee, hacking and coughing. He felt his body struggling to get the gas out of his lungs. The entire room started to go black and he felt like he was drifting away.

He looked up and saw shadowy figures, one was a feminine form, the other a large man. They looked like they were fighting. The fat figure was making snakelike movements and the other was shooting spikes out of the ground, but missing.

He stopped coughing and forced his throat closed. He stood shakily and gripped his blade. His vision cleared slightly and he could just make out the large man who attacked him. He was now holding Elsa by the neck, breathing fumes into her face. She wasn't breathing them, though, as it looked like a clear piece of ice formed over her face.

Nathan stumbled towards the man and readied his blade. He drew up behind him and rammed his blade into the man's back as hard as he could. The man howled loudly and looked back at Nathan. Nathan gave him a groggy smile and tried to say something, but he launched back into a coughing fit.

As he was coughing, Nathan looked at the hilt of his blade in the man's back. The same sickly green gas was pouring out of the wound, rolling over Nathans leather gloved hands. He had just enough time to think about how glad he was for the gloves before he felt a stabbing pain in the hand.

He felt the world grow dull, and wondered if he was dying. He felt his head hit the floor with a dull thud, but the thudding didn't stop. It became louder and started hitting in rhythm. His eyes fluttered open and he saw the gates of Arendelle moving away from him. He tried to extend a hand towards them, but his arm refused to move. Everything faded to black again.

He came to, and found himself being carried over someone's shoulder. He couldn't see much except rock and moss, nothing that would tell him where he was. He heard voices talking to each other, but from the echo it sounded like they were speaking into barrels. He tried to move his arm again but it was still stubbornly unresponsive. The blackness overtook his vision once again.

He heard voices again, much clearer this time, and tried once again to move. He couldn't move but he could make out some of what the voices said.  
"-ease, help us!"  
"What happ-"  
"We were-"  
"dangerous magic-"  
"-ould wake him."

Than Nathan jerked awake. He tried to gasp for breath, but found his lungs still blocked by the foul gas. He started coughing again, trying to look around. He found that he was on the ground, that he was in some sort of valley, and that he was surrounded by some sort of little creatures. He saw Anna and Elsa among them, making him assume that they didn't mean to harm him.

He started feeling faint as his coughing fit continued. He knew if this kept up he wouldn't wake up again. He searched franticly in his mind for some power that might save him.

One of the creatures approached and put a small, hard hand on his forehead and said in a deep gravelly voice "Please, be still."

Nathan waved it off. He didn't need to be still, he needed to clear his lungs. He tried to focus his power but felt it blocked by something. He tried again and again to summon his magic but couldn't. After a few seconds he realized what was blocking his power.

He stopped his thrashing on the ground and brought a knee up to his chest. He then hammered it away from him in the direction of the small thing as hard as he could. It was more dense than he thought it would be, but his leg was still able to send it flying.

He heard a few gasps as the thing flew through the air, but he had bigger problems. His mind was starting to slip back into the dark of unconsciousness from lack of air. He summoned up power from his core and released the spell. It was unfocused, but it should still do what he needed it to.

His body dissolved into one big non-solid shape. He felt his physical form give way to a shadow, and his mind cleared immensely now that he didn't actually need to breathe. The spell would only last a second, but all he needed to do was move.

His shadow jerked to the side of where he had been laying on the ground into the middle of a group of the little creatures he had seen before. The ones that saw him scattered into a loose circle around him and pulled those that didn't see him out of the way.

His body formed out of the shadow and he doubled over, gasping for air. He looked over to where he had been before he shadow formed and saw a puff of the green gas that had been stuck in his lungs, choking him just a second ago.

Anna rushed over to him and put a hand on his back. She bent over to get a better look at his face and said "Are you ok? Do you need anything?"

He waved her off and straightened up. "I'm… I'm fine." He took a few more deep breaths and looked up. He hadn't paid much attention to the little things that had been surrounding him before, but they were very hard to ignore now. Most of them were just standing around, gazing at him. A few were helping the one he had kicked back to its feet. He looked at Anna with a questioning look. "The hell are these things?"

Anna laughed awkwardly and said "Well… ever heard of trolls?"

Nathan looked around at the countless faces staring at him and shrugged, saying "I thought they'd be bigger." He looked across the sea of faces at Elsa, who was still standing by where he had been standing. She was just looking at him sadly. He motioned for her to come over, and she did. She picked her way through the crowd carefully and came to his side. "Hey" he said "what happened back there, I kind of…"

Elsa interrupted him, saying "Yea, about that…" Nathan gave her a concerned look, and she just pointed to his right hand. He looked down at the glove and almost gasped.

The leather was warped and shriveled. He lifted the bottom of it and looked at the arm underneath. He wished he hadn't. The skin was all a bruised yellow color and it felt weak. He let the glove snap back down and looked back up at Elsa. She gestured to the troll he had kicked and said "He said it wasn't good, so we just left it on."

Nathan nodded "Glad you did." He saw Elsa's concerned expression and said "It's nothing, I've got stuff for things like this."

Elsa raised an eyebrow and said "Do you get poison burns often?"

Nathan gave her a smug look and jokingly said "Maybe I do."

A voice came from the crowd. The troll that Nathan kicked earlier stepped out of the crowd and said "You should count yourself lucky, boy. You were nearly killed." He stepped forward and motioned for Nathan to bend down to talk to him. He looked to Elsa and she nodded. He knelt down to hear what the troll had to say.

"Elsa told me about you, and what you've done. I've always held a great respect for those the Outsider has chosen to mark." He motioned to Nathan's hand "I've done what I could, but I have no doubt that you have more that will help, yes?" Nathan nodded and he continued. "Good, good. But I think that everyone here" he gestured around him "can agree that only rest heals wounds like that."

The trolls around him all nodded and Nathan shrugged. "I suppose so." He didn't agree completely, but he could see the reasoning.

He suddenly got a very bad feeling. The feeling he got when he was in a trap. The troll was reaching towards his head, and Nathan realized what he was about to do. He tried to jump back, to get away, to do anything, but he wasn't fast enough.

His unconscious body slumped to the ground. Elsa and Anna picked it up, thanked the trolls for their help, got Nathan back onto a horse, and rode back to Arendelle.

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authors thing:

Thanks for reading!  
As always leave a review, and if you like it you could do a follow or favorite or whatever it is.


	12. Chapter 12

Nathan opened his eyes. He slowly became aware of his surroundings. He was lying in a well-made bed with thick, heavy blankets. The blankets were draped over him in the same way they were over people in hospitals, so Nathan assume he had been cared for over whatever period of time he had been unconscious.

Nathan sat up in the bed and noticed several things at once. The first was that there was a person sitting opposite him with their head drooping down and their breath coming slowly. It was clear that they were asleep, and Nathan had no intention of waking them. The second thing he realized was that his gear was gone. Every layer of armor, every belt and pouch, even his gloves were gone. The third thing he noticed was a bone charm closed in his hand. He raised the charm to his ear and closed his eyes, listening. It was the numbing charm he had given to Elsa. He wondered for a moment why he had it before he remembered what happened to his hand.

He looked down at the hand and drew a sharp breath. The skin on the top of the limb was discolored and flaking off, and the veins that ran through stood out a deep blue against the pale skin, not something he was entirely ready to wake up to. He opened and closed his hand, feeling the muscles inside move. The damage seemed superficial overall, the only thing that seemed really damaged was the skin.

He looked at his clothes. His thick armor layers had been replaced by a single layer of a fabric that felt woefully inadequate in comparison to what he normally wore. The fabric was a deep green color, very similar to the green of the Arendelle seal. Nathan felt uneasy as to why his clothes had been changed, and even more uneasy about the location of his usual gear. He cast around the room, but saw neither it nor a place it could be stored.

The person seated across from him gave a jerk in their sleep and brought Nathan back to the immediate situation. He considered waking the person and asking or his gear back, or…

His face twisted into a devilish smile. Or he could find it himself, without alerting anyone. He had never been much of a showoff, but he didn't know how long he had been asleep, and he felt he needed a warm up.

He drew his legs silently over the side of the bed and slipped to the floor, silent as a mouse. He cringed slightly when his feet fell on the cold wood floor, and he found himself wishing he wasn't barefoot. He crept across the floor and made his way to the door. On the way the sleeper in the chair gave another little spasm that stopped Nathan dead in his tracks for fear of waking them, but they just drifted back off into sleep.

He reached the door and put his eye to the lock, peering around the hall outside. It was empty, thankfully, so he turned the knob and opened the door slowly. He exited the room and made his way to the middle of the hall. Now free of his bed he looked around, wondering where to go from here. He crept over to a window and looked out to see what floor he was on. He found himself on the second floor, and on the side of the building that overlooked the courtyard. He tried to remember the tour Anna had given him, attempting to make a mental map of the building, but failed.

An idea popped into his head and he smiled. He focused his power and let it go slowly, feeling the shadows. He poured more energy into the spell than he normally did so that he could get more range on it, to feel the entire building. He felt all the moving shadows of people, scurrying around in the halls and rooms like bees in a hive. Nathan ignored those, though, and focused on a distant pounding sensation. The many bone runes and charms he always kept in his pockets called to him from across the building. They were somewhere below him, but that was all he could discern.

He opened his eyes and looked up. The hall he was in went off in two directions, and he didn't know which one to take. Another idea entered into his mind, and he looked to the floor at his shadow. He gave a wave towards it and funneled another small portion of energy into it. As he did he said "Direct me…" in a voice that almost sounded too deep, and pointed to the distant artifacts in his mind. His shadow shivered for a moment, then moved against the light that cast it, pointing to the hall on Nathans left. He grinned, thankful that it sometimes seemed his shadow paid more attention than he did.

He set off down the indicated hall and continued to follow his shadows direction. It led him through vaguely familiar halls in the direction of his things. As he went he had time to think. He didn't know how long he had been unconscious. His change of clothes would suggest that he was out for at least more than a day, but his hair and nails were the same length he remembered them being, so he couldn't have been out for more than a week. He would've asked his shadow how long he was out, but it wouldn't have any good way to give him an answer, and he was using it already for navigating.

As he descended a spiral staircase he felt his gear getting closer. He came off the stairs into another wide hall and stopped. He put a hand to the floor and tried to feel the vibrations in the wood. There was a steady pounding of feet, to heavy and in-time to just be someone walking. He swept to the side of the hall and pushed himself against the wall and under a small end table. He kept his hand on the floor and felt the vibrations get closer. After a few seconds he heard the distinct sound of boots, and saw a man in a guard outfit turn the corner and start walking towards Nathan.

Nathan pushed himself back further into the shadow and held his breath, preying the green of his clothes didn't make him stand out. The guard walked past, oblivious of the person crouching under the table watching him.

As soon as he passed Nathan dislodged himself from the table and crept away from the man. Nathan continued following his shadow until it fell flat against a heavy-set unmarked door. He put his eye to the lock and peered in. there was a dark stone staircase descending into what looked like flickering torchlight. He tried the door and found that, to his surprise, it wasn't locked. He opened the door silently and moved inside.

The cold stone sucked the heat from Nathan's feet as he stalked down the stairs. His shadow danced ahead of him, still pointing towards his gear. He came to the bottom of the staircase and looked out cautiously. It appeared to be a dungeon of some kind, far below the floor of the castle above. He couldn't help but wonder why his stuff would be down here. He listened carefully to the echoes that bounced off the solid grey walls and didn't hear anything but a few rats squeaking in dark corners.

He motioned towards his shadow again, stopping the flow of power he had been feeding the spell. He would search each cell on his own. His shadows job was done. He put the power from the spell animating his shadow into sensing shadows, and felt nothing but the rats moving. Cutting the power to the spell, he crept forwards. He knew there was no-one down here now, but one could never be too careful.

He passed several empty cells all furnished with exactly what he would expect, uncomfortable looking beds, uncomfortable looking blankets, uncomfortable looking chains, and uncomfortable looking stone.

After a few of those cells Nathan came to one cell that was not like the others. The door to the cell was a solid built wooden door, with iron reinforcements lining the whole thing. There was a small slit at about eye level to look into the cell that was about half open. Nathan straightened up and peered inside.

His gear was all there. It had been put on a mannequin and the mannequin was set in the middle of the cell. He tried the door handle and found it locked. The lock looked extremely heavy. Nathan doubted that he would be able to get through that even if he could pick locks. Luckily, however, he didn't have to.

He let a good pulse of energy go and felt his body dissolve into a shadow. He flowed towards the door and through the little slit. He felt himself squeeze through and come out on the inside of the cell. He contracted his shadow form and felt his body form back out of it. He was now standing inside the cell, looking at the mannequin.

He stepped forwards and started stripping the gear off the mock-person and placing it on himself. A few minutes later he was fully equipped and ready to go.

He cast the shadow-form spell again and seeped out of the looking slit. He formed outside the cell and pulled his left glove on. He looked at his injured right hand and realized he was still gripping the bone charm tightly. He put the charm in his other hand and pulled the glove over the flaking skin, clenching his fist to make sure the glove was on as tight as possible.

He crept his way back to the top of the stairs and peered out the lock. He didn't see anybody, so he opened the door and entered the hall. Now he had to find Elsa. He let energy drip into a spell and closed his eyes, feeling the shadows.

He started his search with looking for human forms. Once he located most people in the building he thought of anything that would easily identify Elsa. Her cape, he though. It would cast a shadow speckled with the reflections of light passing through it. It would be easy to find. Sure enough, after a few moments of looking he felt the abnormal shadow of the cape. She was on the third floor in a large room with one other person. The other person was likely Anna, but there was no sure way to tell.

Nathan pointed to that location with his mind and opened his eyes, gestured to his own shadow, and said again "Guide me."

His shadow again shivered for a moment than struck a pose flat on the floor as if Nathan was pointing. He followed and it fell ahead of him, leading. It led him back to the staircase he had come down on, luckily the guard who had been in the way the first time wasn't there again.

He made his way up the winding stairs, all the way up to the third floor. He stalked through the strangely empty halls in the direction that his shadow was falling. After about a minute of creeping through the halls he came to another door. This one was similar to the study door that Nathan had gotten knocked down earlier. He peaked through the lock and saw Elsa's back facing towards him. She was sitting at a desk, hunched over writing something. He could see the edge of someone else's dress out of the corner of the lock, but no matter how he tried to turn to angle himself he couldn't get a better view of the other person.

He heard a floorboard creak behind his and turned to look at the source. A guard had just turned a corner and was about to see Nathan. He hurriedly opened the door and slipped inside as quietly as possible. The door latched shut quietly behind him as he took in the room. Elsa was still writing facing away from him, and the other person, who Nathan now saw was Anna, was looking over her shoulder and talking to quietly for him to hear.

They seemed absorbed in whatever they were writing, and Nathan didn't really want to interrupt them so he looked around, found and extra chair, and took a seat. He waited for them to either finish what they were doing or to turn around.

After a few minutes of sitting in silence and no sign of them stopping he cleared his throat. Elsa and Anna turned, gasping in surprise. Nathan smiled at their reaction and stood. He put his left hand across his chest and bowed. "My queen." He said in a respectful tone.

The two women looked at each other, confused. Elsa looked at him unsurely and said "but… but the trolls said four…" her voice trailed off and she shook her head, refocusing on Nathan. "You're up sooner than expected."

Nathan put his arms behind him and stretched them out, producing several loud popping sounds. "Yea, about that…" he brought his arms back in front and stretched again "…how long was I out?"

Elsa looked sideways at Anna than back to Nathan and said "You were supposed to be out for four days, but you've only been out for two." She looked him up and down, then said "How… how did you get all that back?" motioning to all his gear.

Nathan smiled and shrugged. "I found it." He said sarcastically. Elsa and Anna both just sighed, and Nathan laughed. "I woke up and had to find it."

Elsa's eyes widened and she looked at the door, saying "Why wasn't I told you were awake?" she looked at Nathan and said "How did you get through the door-" she took a key from the desk behind her and said "-this is the only key."

Nathan spread his arms and said "some people are just so good they don't need keys." Elsa rolled her eyes and turned back to the desk.

Anna was still looking at Nathan with a worried expression. He raised an eyebrow at her and she said "The trolls said that your hand would take four days to heal." She motioned to the gloved limb and asked "Is it already better?"

Nathan gave as reassuring a smile as he could muster and said "Yes, it's much better."

It wasn't a lie. Not technically. He hadn't said it was fully healed, he had said it was better, which was true. Besides, the damage wasn't anything to worry about anyways. He felt like he should change the subject away from his injuries, so he pointed to the desk and said "what are you two working on?"

Elsa turned in her seat to look at Nathan while she spoke. "We had that name copied and sent out to as many places we could get it. Only one kingdom has responded so far, a place called Corona." Nathan thought about the name. Had he ever ben there? No, he thought, that was the kingdom that did the weird lantern thing that he had read about once. He ran over a quick list of places his contracts had taken him in his head anyways, and confirmed he had never been. Elsa continued, "They said that if it is what they think it is, than they want to send some people our way to help us "deal with it", whatever that means."

Nathan thought he could guess what "deal with it" meant, but decided to keep that observation to himself. He looked over Elsa's shoulder at the paper and asked "So what's this?"

Elsa turned back to the paper and said "We're trying to figure out what they mean by "send some people". We were going to try and have them here by the time you woke up so that you could start working with them as soon as possible, but now that your awake we may as well just tell them to come on down."

Nathan nodded. He was eager to keep up on this problem, seeing as now two attempts on Elsa's life had been made. He thought about the journal Prattchet had given him and something clicked in his mind. "Do you still have that book on you?" he asked eagerly.

Elsa shook her head and said "No, I have it stored in my room. Why?"

Nathan thought back to what it had said, trying to be sure about the things he was connecting. "Didn't it say something about his having a nightmare about someone turning into gas?"

Elsa said "Yea, wh…" her voice trailed off and she turned slowly to face Nathan, her eyes widening. "Do you really think that…" her voice trailed off again.

Nathan nodded. "I don't see any connections to make other than that. Speaking of which, what happened with the guy I stabbed?"

Anna and Elsa looked at each other uncomfortably, and Anna said "He's… he's dead, after you stabbed him he just kind of…" she put her hands up and brought them back down slowly, blowing a raspberry as she did.

Elsa rolled her eyes and said "Very mature, Anna."

Anna turned to Elsa and said in a fairly bad imitation of Elsa's voice "Very mature Anna"

Elsa opened her mouth to retort, but Nathan cut her off, more interested in what Anna had said than their sibling banter. "So he just deflated?"

Anna rose her hands again and pursed her lips, about to repeat her little demonstration but stopped when Elsa glared at her. Elsa turned back to Nathan and nodded. "All that was left was his skin and clothes on the floor."

Nathan raised an eyebrow at her and said "There were no… organs, no bones, no nothing?"

She shook her head and said "No, just skin."

Nathan put ha hand over his mouth and looked up, thinking. "Do you still have the skin?" he asked through his hand cautiously. Elsa nodded and he took his hand away from his mouth. "Good, I'd like to see it today." He looked around the room for some kind of clock. "Speaking of, what time is it?"

Anna shrugged and said "Late afternoon."

Nathan was about to say something, but was interrupted by a sudden growling of his stomach. He put a hand to his belly and said "Think there's still some food left?"

Anna laughed at this and Elsa snickered slightly. Elsa stood up and said "I'll see if I can get you anything." Anna stood up to follow them, but Elsa waved her back. "You stay and finish the letter, you know what it has to say." Anna looked a bit dejected at this, but obeyed. Elsa walked past Nathan and opened the door, motioning for him to go first. He bowed his head slightly in acknowledgment and walked through.

They walked side by side through the halls. The silence between them started to weigh on both of them, and Elsa was the first to break the silence. "So" she said in a joking voice "did you sleep well?"

Nathan smirked and said "Yes, it's funny how that works, spells and all." He looked down at himself and continued "I think I would have slept much better if I hadn't been changed."

Elsa rolled her eyes, saying "Both me and Anna decided that locking it up would be the safest thing to do, especially with all the stuff in those pockets."

Nathan felt over his pockets to check if either one had stolen anything from him. After a moment or two of checking he said "And what sort of toys did you find in my pockets?" Elsa looked at him as if he had grown another head. He clarified his meaning "I've got lots of toys in my pockets. They're all great fun, if you know how to use them."

Elsa rolled her eyes and said sarcastically "Because all those scalpels and knives and vials seem like so much fun."

Nathan gave a loud, fake, indignant gasp. "I wouldn't be caught dead without them." He said in an accent that might have been French.

Elsa couldn't help but to laugh at this. She finished laughing, cleared her throat and asked "But really, what are all those knives for? I'd imagine you just need the one." She gestured to the sword at Nathan's belt.

He sighed and shook his head. Well, if I see a painting I like, I can't just rip it out of the frame, can I?"

Elsa smirked "Of course not! You aren't just some brute, after all."

Nathan nodded and said "Certainly not! And people tend to pay less for paintings that have the hell ripped out of them."

Elsa nodded, then said "One thing that we didn't find were lock picks. I'd expect you of all people to have a few of those."

Nathan smiled at this, and said "ha, yea. I can't actually pick locks. Not much of a point to carrying a tool you can't use, right?"

Elsa started to nod, but stopped herself. "Wait, if you can't pick locks than how did you get your stuff back?" she stopped in front of the door to the dining hall

Nathan grinned at her and said mysteriously "Maybe I'm just so good I don't need to pick locks." He stepped forward and pushed the doors to the dining hall open. He heard Elsa call after him, but he smiled and pretended not to hear.


	13. Chapter 13

Elsa accompanied Nathan while he ate his food. The first half of the meal was spent by Elsa trying to pry the answer of how Nathan had gotten into the cell in the dungeons to retrieve his gear, and by Nathan dodging and avoiding giving her a straight answer. The closest to an actual answer that he gave her was that it was "Magic" and that if he actually told her exactly how he did it, the mystery would be ruined.

Elsa gave up after about half Nathans food was gone and he changed the subject away from his powers. "So… can you tell me anything about this Corona place? You ever deal with them before?" Nathan asked through a mouthful of food.

Elsa nodded and said "Yes, we have some prior relations. There are just some pretty basic trade agreements between our two kingdoms, but apparently Anna has met the princess and the prince of the kingdom when I…" she caught herself, cleared her throat and continued "…anyway, Anna is happy that out of all the kingdoms Corona is the one that responded. I think she just wants to see them again."

Nathan nodded and continued eating. He asked "Do you know what experience they might have had with this magic?"

Elsa shook her head, saying "No, I didn't talk to them much. You should talk to Anna about this, I didn't talk to them at all beyond a quick hello and goodbye. They didn't seem like the type to deal with gas-people, though."

Nathan smirked. "Speaking of which, you said we still have the skin of that guy, right? I'd like to see it after we're done here."

Elsa nodded and looked around. The dining hall was mostly empty, with the exception of a few servants who had probably missed the earlier meal and the cooks managing the food. The windows let out to the view of the courtyard outside. Snow was falling heavily, making it difficult to see even halfway across the yard. It was a heavy storm, but it was the last of the winter. She could feel it.

She looked at Nathan, clearing her mind of everything he had done for her, and took in just his appearance. He was not someone she would expect to see in a castle unless he was there without the owner's knowledge. His many belt, buckles, pouches, and pockets made for an extraordinary appearance, as if he had some substance or elixir for every situation. Yet that was not true, she had found this out when she went through the pockets when he was unconscious. She had found a few pieces of paper, charms of bone, bags of money, and a few vials of chemicals, but noting beyond that. She had expected to find some kind of magnificent text that explained some great secret of magic or gave some knowledge forbidden from falling to mortal ears, but she had found thing that would be perfectly normal for an assassin of his caliber.

Nathan looked up from his food and saw Elsa staring at him. He averted his gaze, but kept it on Elsa from the corner of his eye. He felt like he was being examined under some great microscope, and he didn't like the feeling. He started to fidget, clenching and unclenching a fist under the table, feeling Elsa's gaze burning into him.

When he couldn't stand it anymore he stood. "Alright, let go see that dead guy!" he said with an enthusiasm dropping with sarcasm. Elsa looked at his food with a questioning look as there was still at least a fourth of it left. Nathan waved her concern off, indicating he had had enough.

She stood and indicated a door at the far end of the hall. She and Nathan set off together to see the skin of a dead man.

The walk to the room containing the corpse was quiet, and Nathan remarked to himself that it was the same room the three men Nathan had killed had been stored in. he pushed the door open and stepped inside. It was devoid of the smell of rot this time, to Nathan s surprise. He spotted something that looked like a pile of clothes on one of the tables. He pointed to it and said "Is that it?"

Elsa nodded and followed him over to it. He looked closer at the pile and took one end of it, pulling it lengthwise over the table. It uncoiled and revealed a wrinkled face amid the folds of cloth. Nathan examined the face, but found nothing that would help him. "It looks like a snakeskin." He said and started examining the pockets. Again, he found nothing that would help him.

He lifted the skin off the table by the head and held it as far off the ground as he could, leaving a few inches between the floor and the feet of the skin. The skin had some kind of weight inside it, but Nathan couldn't find where it lay.

A thought occurred to him and he drew his blade. He heard Elsa say concernedly "What are you doing?"

He drew his sword up so the point was against the chest of the skin and prepared to put it through. "Looking." He said in a matter-of-fact voice. He thrust the blade through the skin and dragged it down, putting a large hole in the breast of the skin.

He put a hand inside and felt around, scrunching his face up in a scowl. "Better be worth it…" he said under his breath. His hand met with something buried in the throat of the skin and he grabbed ahold of it. It was firmly attached to the skin by something he couldn't feel. He drew his arm up and brought it slamming down, yanking the thing with all his might. It gave with an unearthly tearing sound and came off the skin. Nathan withdrew the thing from the sack-like skin and looked at it.

It was a small round thing, like a pearl. Nathan turned it over in his hand and found the surface flawless. It glowed with an otherworldly light that seemed to come from the center of the orb. He held it up against the light of a nearby lantern to see if the light inside changed. It didn't, staying the same even though the light should have disturbed it in some way.

Elsa touched his shoulder and said "What is that?" in an almost fearful voice. Nathan shrugged and held it out to Elsa, who backed away from it like it was going to beat her. Nathan pulled the thing the thing away from her and stepped forwards

"What's the matter? What's wrong?" he asked concernedly. Elsa's eyes were locked on the orb and her hands were raised defensively. Nathan could see he wasn't going to get an answer as long as she could see it, so he put it behind his back and slipped it into a pocket, hiding it.

He stepped forwards to Elsa, his hands up to show it was gone. "Elsa… Elsa, its ok, it's gone." He said in a soft, gentle voice.

Elsa lowered her hands slowly and put a hand to her temple. "I'm fine… I just… did you hear it?" she looked at Nathan with concern.

Nathan shook his head and said "Hear what?" slightly confused.

Elsa looked at him like she couldn't believe what he had just said. "Hear wha…" she repeated incredulously. "The giant, horrible, unbearable screeching that it was making? You know-" she said sarcastically "-that!"

Nathan shook his head. "No, didn't hear it." He felt the urge to take the orb out and examine it again, but felt that Elsa would not appreciate his curiosity. He tossed the skin back onto the table it was on when he came in and turned back to Elsa. He said "So, let's go find Anna." Elsa gave him a puzzled look and he reminded her "Talk about Corona." She nodded and exited the room, and Nathan followed.

Nathan spent the walk back to the room Anna and Elsa had first been in asking Elsa about the sound that she had heard from the orb. She wasn't able to tell him much, but what he was able to get out of her was that it was a very loud sound, and that it had made her afraid. She wasn't able to explain why it had unsettled her so much, but she did say the sound was "haunting" and "sad". He asked her to try and replicate the sound, but she declined, saying that if she tried it would sound stupid.

They came to the study and Nathan pulled the door open, holding it for Elsa. She bowed her head slightly and walked in. Nathan followed her in and looked around. Anna was sitting face down at the desk, snoring loudly. Nathan snickered at this slightly, and Elsa sighed. She walked over and shook Anna awake.

Anna jerked and said "Wha… Who?" looking around tiredly. Elsa put a hand on the back of her head and physically turned it so that she was looking at Nathan.

Nathan stepped forwards and said "I'd like to ask you a few things, Anna."

She looked up at him blankly for a second before wiping the sleep out of her eyes and yawning widely. She blinked a few times and said tiredly "Ok, what do you want to ask?"

Behind her Elsa lifted a paper off the desk she had been sleeping on. Nathan could see something dripping off the paper back onto the desk. Nathan shot Elsa a questioning look, and she pointed to Elsa, the desk, the paper, and drew a line down from the side of her mouth. Nathan nodded, Anna drooled in her sleep.

Nathan shook his head and turned back to Anna, who was still looking at him blankly. He said "So… you're happy that Corona responded?"

She continued looking at him with a blank expression for a second, than her face lit up with excitement. "Oh, yea! I hope Rapunzel comes, that would be so great! It feels like I haven't seen her in forever. Where's…" her voice trailed off as she turned back to the desk and shuffled a few things around, looking for something. "I had the letter ready to be sent, but-"

Elsa cut her off by clearing her throat and holding up the soggy piece of paper. "Is this the letter, Anna?"

Anna turned, looked at it for a second, and blushed. She looked at the desk and saw a small puddle of saliva she hadn't seen before. She turned back to Elsa and said sheepishly "Well… I had a letter written… but…"

Elsa rolled her eyes and pulled a chair up to the desk. She took a seat, readied new paper and produced a pen from some corner of the desk. Anna scooted closer to her, practically leaning on her shoulder, and poised herself so she might be able to write too. Elsa looked over at her and playfully pushed her chair away, saying "Maybe I should handle this one."

Elsa started scribbling down words onto the paper and Anna huffed. She turned to Nathan and said "Did you have anything else to ask me?" sourly.

Nathan smirked, saying "Yes, of course." He pulled a chair up in front of Anna and sat down. "Who's Rapunzel?"

Anna smiled and put a hand to her chin and leaned back. She took one deep breath before starting, saying "So it all started when Elsa froze the…" she looked over at Elsa sheepishly. Nathan noticed that Elsa had stopped writing. Anna cleared her throat and continued "…anyways, there were a lot of people from all over the place when that happened, and Rapunzel was one of those people. She was here with her husband, a guy named Eugene. We met after Elsa fixed the summer, and we became friends really fast."

Nathan nodded. It seemed a pretty normal way to meet, minus the magic sister, of course. "So what experience would she have with this…" he looked for the right word for what was happening recently, but found nothing that described it adequately. "…situation?"

Anna shrugged and said "Well, I don't know a whole lot about her past, but I do know that she had some bad experiences with some woman. She never said what the woman did, though. She didn't like to talk about it"

Nathan nodded and said "I see. How long would it take her to get here?"

Elsa called over her shoulder "The trip by boat takes about two days, by land it's about a week." And continued to scribble on the letter.

"How long will the letter take to reach her?" Nathan asked.

Elsa turned to him and said "With a fast ship they'll be reading it tomorrow."

Nathan raised an eyebrow and said "I thought you said ships took two days."

She gave him a devilish smile and said "We here at Arendelle have always prided ourselves on being ahead of the game, and as such we've got a few new ship designs." She spoke like she was making a presentation to a crowd. Her public speaking mannerisms dropped away and she said almost in a whisper "You aren't the only one with tricks up your sleeve."

Nathan raised an eyebrow again. "A bit proud of your new boat, Elsa?"

She pouted and turned back to the letter, saying "Well, I have every right to be, don't I? Fastest ships in the sea has got to be worth something."

Nathan gave her a look that said he didn't quite believe what she was saying. "Fastest, eh? How'd you manage that?" Nathan didn't know a great deal about ships, but he did know that the benefits of having such a ship would be great.

Elsa perked up slightly and turned back to Nathan. She said "I use my magic to create a…" she searched for the right word "…shard of ice that has a little bit of my magic inside of it. I make the magic in the shard blow winter winds into the sails of a ship."

Nathan was caught off guard by this. She could enchant her ice? It seemed that Elsa's power grew more impressive the more he learned of it. He couldn't help but wonder if the same was true for his power as well. "Well, I suppose that would make a ship faster." He said, sounding a little more impressed than he meant to.

He shook his head. "So anyways, how long is it expected until she gets here?" he asked.

Elsa shrugged and said unconcernedly "Maybe two days after she gets the letter, so three days from now."

Nathan let a deep breath hiss out slowly from in-between his teeth. He considered himself a reasonably patient person, but he didn't know it he would be able to just sit idle for three whole days. He would have to find something to occupy his time or else he might go mad.

Elsa gave him one of those devilish smiles that he was starting to get used to and said "We could always have Pabbi put you back to sleep."

Nathan pointed to the letter and said "Don't you have something to be doing?"

Elsa smirked at Nathan and turned back to the letter, resuming her scribbling. Nathan pulled a bone charm from one of his many pockets and worked it around in his hand. Anna eyed the thing cautiously but didn't say anything.

As Nathan toyed with the charm in his hand he remembered the small orb he had gotten earlier. He pictured the thing in his mind, not wanting to take it from its pocket for fear of upsetting Elsa again. He turned the mental image over in his mind, thinking about what it could be. He'd never seen anything like it before. It was like a pearl, perfectly spherical and smooth. He tried to think of what the light inside it had been like, but couldn't recall exactly how the light had looked. He had to wonder at why it had been inside the skin of the man. For all his thought he gave the matter he couldn't come up with anything.

The thing hadn't seemed any more powerful than an average bone charm, so he assumed it would have an effect similar to a bone charm. It did have a strange effect on Elsa, something Nathan had never seen in a bone charm, making the sound that scared her. Every time he tried to think of what the light looked like he simply couldn't picture it.

He continued thinking like this until eventually Elsa stood from the desk and said to both Anna and Nathan "Ok, it's done."

Anna stood quickly and walked over to the door saying "Finally! Come on, let's go do something!"

Nathan stood and stretched his back. He said "Ah, it's about time. How long is that letter?" he stepped over to the desk and looked at the paper. It was several sheets high, and each one was filled out completely. The ink on most of the pages was dry, but it smeared on a few of the top pages. The letters seemed to be along the lines of "We need your help, weird stuff is happening, please help us"

Nathan eyed the paper, amused that Elsa could even find a way to stretch such a simple message so long. He turned to the door and walked out behind Anna. Elsa took the papers in her arms and followed them out.

Nathan accompanied them to dinner which he didn't eat, as he had already eaten. The meal passed by uneventfully, with unimportant small-talk being exchanged. The night passed uneventfully as well, and Nathan eventually retired to his bed.

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Authors thing:

hey, I'm going somewhere over spring break, so i probably wont be able to post anything for about a week or so. I'll keep writing though, so I'll probably come back with a hundred more chapters.

so woooo

remember to leave reviews and follow or whatever that whole thing is (If you want to)


	14. Chapter 14

Nathan stood on the shore of the fjord, the cold water lapping against the bottoms of his boots. The frigid air made his lips crack and his fingers numb. Despite this, he stood looking out over the distant lapping waves of the ocean, waiting for something. Some small portion of his mind told him to go back inside where it was warm, but he suppressed that small voice. He continued his vigilant watch over the ocean waves. A single solitary geyser of water blasted up from the surface, grabbing Nathans attention. Seconds later the geyser gave way to a massive hulking form.

A smile that was almost relief crossed his face as he saw the whale burst out of the water. The sight of the giant gave him some kind of comfort, the way that a ray of sunshine did for other people. Nathan knew it had something to so with the fact that all bone charms and runes were made from whalebone, but that wasn't it. Not all of it.

He focused as much as he could on the creature as it plummeted back through the water and could swear it was looking directly at him. Its eye seemed to have an otherworldly glint to it, as if it could see things that Nathan couldn't even imagine. As the last bit of the monster of an animal disappeared back into the void of the ocean Nathan heard the gravel crunch behind him.

He spun on his heel and instinctively put a hand on the hilt of his blade, ready to fight. He found himself face to face with Elsa, who was looking startled by his reaction. Nathan let out a deep breath and watched it fog up in front of his face, calming his nerves. He turned back to the ocean and said over his shoulder "What are you doing up so early?" as the splash from the whale settled back into the waves of the sea.

Elsa walked up next to him and peered out to the sea the same way Nathan did, trying to see what he saw. She had seen whales jump from the ocean but never as close as that one had. She looked sideways at Nathan and said "Whale watching?" in a slightly puzzled voice.

Nathan shrugged than after a brief pause said "Yea, I guess you could say that." There was another brief pause before he turned to Elsa and asked "Does Arendelle process whales?"

Elsa was slightly taken aback by the strangeness of the question but answered anyways. "Of course, it's a major source of revenue for the kingdom."

Nathan nodded. If they processed whales here, than he would have access to whale bone pretty consistently. If he had access to whale bone he might be able to make his own charms and runes. This job of protecting Elsa and Anna just kept getting better and better. There was a problem, though, in that he didn't know how to make runes or bone charms. Certainly he knew what they were made of and how they would be constructed, but he didn't know whether or not he would need to do something to actually make them powerful or give them their strange properties.

Something bumped against his foot, snapping him out of his thoughts. Elsa saw it before he did. She gave a little gasp when she saw what it was. It was a small plate of bone, about small enough to fit in the palm of the hand. A mark, the same one that Nathan had shown her burned on the back of his hand, was burned on the surface of the bone.

Nathan looked down and saw the rune. He grunted and bent over to pick it up. He straightened up and held the rune up to look at it. He looked out to the ocean, wondering if the whale he had seen had anything to do with the appearance of the rune. Elsa put a hand on his shoulder and said in a hushed voice "What is it?"

Nathan smiled and clutched the rune tightly to his chest. He said "It's a rune. I can use these to learn new spells." Elsa looked at the rune with interest, and Nathan held it out to her. "You take it."

She held her hands up defensively and said "No, no. I… I don't think I need it. I can make whatever spell I want, remember?" she closed Nathans hand around it and pushed it back towards him. "You use it. I want to see what kind of a spell you make."

Nathan held the rune in his palm and nodded. Elsa looked at him expectantly and he realized she wanted him to make spell right now. He turned back to the sea and closed his eyes, letting the sound of the waves wipe his mind clean and focusing his thought on the rune. He felt some part of his mind slip into the void and felt the power of the outsider surround him. He focused his power around him and felt it push the nothingness of the void away.

He was immersed in his own power, dark, suffocating shadows that responded to his every whim. He focused all the shadow into one solid shape in his hand and started working it around. As its shape changed he could feel the effects of the spell he was making changing. He formed it into a simple line, and felt the familiar spell of blink form. He stopped for a moment and considered what kind of a spell he wanted.

His job was now to protect Elsa and Anna, so he wanted a power that would allow him to do this more effectively. He considered what he could do with the spell he had. He cut a line through the line, and it turned from blink to something else. It turned into a simple spell, one that would allow him to manipulate objects from a distance. Not a spell he wanted, so he went back to working the spell around.

An idea popped into his head. He drew a thin line between one pieces of shadow to another, and pulled the two pieces far apart. The spell turned into a movement spell, and he liked the way it looked. It wasn't perfect, though. The spell would be of huge range, but highly costly in terms of energy. The energy the spell used would grow in proportion to the distance to the target, but that would make the spell almost identical to blink. Another idea popped into his head. He focused on a few more runes on his material body and tapped into their power. More shadow appeared for him to work with, and he worked it around.

He cut the line between the two pieces and used the extra shadow to make a strange kind of rift between the two. He fed a line like the one he cut through the rift and pulled the two pieces further apart experimentally. To his mild surprise, this worked, and the line between the two was not pulled or stretched at all. He put the remainder of the shadowy power into the two pieces so that the energy required to cast the spell would be lowered slightly.

He looked over the spell with a critical eye, searching for any fault or imperfection. When he was satisfied with what he had made he pushed on the spell with the power inside the runes. The shape solidified as the runes power was used up. As the last of the runes power dissipated his mind slipped out of the void.

He was, once again, standing on the shore, looking out over the ocean. He looked at the hand he had been holding the rune in. it was clenched shut over his chest, the rune gone. He opened his hand and a few clumps of ash fell into the water. He felt around in his pockets and found sever other runes gone.

Elsa was looking at him with a worried expression. He turned back to her and shook his head, trying to adjust to the sudden ejection from the void. Elsa asked "Are you ok? What were you doing?"

Nathan looked up at her and said "I was making a new spell." He looked at the ash that used to be a rune and said to Elsa "I used the power in that-" he pointed to the ash "-to make the spell."

She looked at the ash than back at Nathan. "You looked like you were just… zoned out. You were just staring forward blankly." Nathan nodded and Elsa's expression grew much more exited. "Well, let's see it!"

Nathan grinned and said "well… it's not a very dramatic spell, it's more of a utility kind of thing, but-"

Elsa cut him off before he could finish by saying "Just shut up and do it!" in an exasperated voice, throwing her arms towards Nathan.

He laughed and focused his power into the new spell. He wasn't exactly sure how to cast it, but it shouldn't be too hard. He focused the spell and felt an alien sensation in his hand. It felt like a small piece of his shadow was in his hand. He could guess what he had to cast the spell on, the same thing he always did. A shadow.

He thrust his hand forwards and gasped as he felt the piece if his shadow leave him and enter Elsa's shadow. As it left Nathans hand it formed into a snakelike streak that hit Elsa's shadow and seemed to burrow into it. Elsa's head turned to follow the streak, but she didn't react to it entering her shadow. Nathan felt the fragment of his shadow settle in Elsa's shadow, and lowered his hand.

Elsa looked at him with a puzzled expression in her face. She said "What did that do?" and started eyeing her shadow anxiously. Nathan took a few steps back from the shore and held up a hand to indicate Elsa should stay where she was.

He walked about twenty feet away than turned. He focused on the spell and felt the fragment of his own shadow inside of Elsa's. He poured power into the spell and wondered briefly what it would feel like.

The next thing he knew his shadow jumped off the ground and stood in front of him. It opened wide into a solid black hole, like a door, and Nathan felt himself yanked through. He felt briefly like he was falling down a pit. It was impossible to see anything through the inky nothingness that surrounded him now. The air around him felt strange, as if it was devoid of all light, sound, and heat. It wasn't cold, it was just as if there was no such thing as cold or hot. The feeling was totally alien.

Then, as soon as he had been sucked into the shadow, he was flung from it. He heard a splash from somewhere under him and felt his feet hit solid ground. He braced his body, expecting to fall off balance or to tumble head over heels, but nothing came. He looked down and found his feet submerged in water about halfway up his boots. He looked in front of him and saw the cold fjord again. He turned and saw Elsa just starting to turn around, probably looking for the source of the splash.

Elsa wasn't sure what she had just seen. Nathan had stepped through his shadow and then was just… gone. She heard a splash behind her, and spun on her heels to face the splashing. She found herself facing Nathan, who was looking in her direction with a disoriented look on his face. She stepped towards him but stopped when she realized that he was about ankle deep in the cold water.

He shook his head to clear his thoughts and refocused on Elsa. He stepped out of the water and let out a breath. "Well, that felt weird." He said in a matter-of-fact voice.

Elsa looked from the spot he had been standing at to where he had appeared. Her brow furrowed, and she asked "How is that different from the teleporting you already do?"

Nathan raised an eyebrow as he started shaking water off of his boots. He asked in a confused voice "Teleporting…?" he ran through his powers and realized she meant his blink. "Oh! Blink, umm…" he paused and tried to think of how to explain it. "It's like… if…" coming up with a comparison was harder than he had imagined. "If you're sewing a cloth… and the distance you travel is how far you get through the cloth… than… blinking is just sewing through the cloth, and that was like folding the cloth and putting the needle through."

The comparison didn't sound nearly as god as it had in his head, but Elsa nodded in understanding. She asked "Than why ever use your blink?"

Nathan sighed. Explaining his powers was weird. "The blink takes very little energy, and the other one takes a lot more. But Blink has a fairly short range, whereas the other one has an unlimited range." He paused for a moment. "I think."

Elsa giggled slightly at this, then said "what are you going to call it?" Nathan looked at her questioningly and she clarified in a voice like it was obvious "The power."

"Oh" Nathan said "uh…" he started pacing, thinking of what a suitable name would be. "Well" he thought out loud "it's a power that moves me around, so it should be motion based. I kind of… step into the shadow, so step is good. I come out of shadows, so I think that should be in there. How about "shadow step"?"

Elsa repeated the words "shadow step" to herself a few times. It was accurate, she supposed. He did step into a shadow, and come out of one too. It had an ominous kind of ring to it as well, like it was something to be afraid of. She nodded, approving of the name. "I like it."

Nathan smiled, feeling a twinge of happiness somewhere in his chest. He didn't know why he felt this, but he accepted he did. Maybe he was getting soft. Maybe he was in love.

He scowled at the last thought. Love? Certainly not, not ever. Maybe he admired Elsa, but he certainly didn't have feelings for her.

She motioned back towards the castle and said "you want to go in? It's awfully cold out here." Nathan only just took notice of how cold it really was. He felt his body start to give a shiver, but he tensed up and stopped it before it became noticeable. He nodded and followed her towards the castle.

The sun was just starting to come up over the horizon, bright light gleaming on the windows and rooftops of the castle. The great doors of the main entrance ground open slowly, and both Nathan and Elsa were forced to shut their eyes by a blast of warm air from inside the castle.

The pair traipsed their way into the castle and took seats by a large open fireplace. The air inside was a sharp contrast from the freezing temperature outside, the warm glow of the fire casting long dancing shadows on the wall behind them. The light of the sun, just beginning to rise, cast another shadow on the wall to the side. They sat in silence for a moment just enjoying the warmth of the spitting flame.

After both had warmed enough, Nathan said to Elsa "So, they're to arrive today. What are we going to do with them?"

Elsa sighed with just a hint of apprehension in her breath and said "I don't know, what should we do? What can we do but wait?" she put a hand to her temple, saying "we'll just have to wait and see what they say."

Nathan nodded. He didn't like it, but until the royals from Corona arrived he didn't have a clue who had been attacking Elsa, or why. Waiting didn't sit well with him. Nothing had happened in the three day period between Elsa sending the letter, but Nathan knew it was just a matter of time before something did happen.

They continued to sit in silence until the sun was casting its light right through the window, signaling that morning had arrived. Elsa pushed herself out of her chair and Nathan followed suit. Elsa turned to Nathan before exiting the room and said "Hungry?"

Nathan smiled at her and said "Ravenous, as usual." Elsa smiled at his comment. It was something of a joke that had developed between the two. Elsa had commented two days ago that Nathan had never actually gone to go get food on his own, and Nathan had retorted that that must have been the reason he was always hungry. The comment wasn't very funny, but it had seemed hilarious at the time. Maybe it had had something to do with the wine Elsa had been enjoying at the time.

They walked to the dining hall. Anticipation was thick in the air. All the staff of the castle had been informed that the prince and princess of Corona would be arriving today for an indeterminate period of time, but none had been told why. All were on edge and eager to begin serving the new royals when they arrived.

The breakfast that the chefs had prepared was even more exquisite than it normally was, with massive amounts of finely arranged edibles in artful displays. The whole thing seemed rather pointless to Nathan, as all of it was just going to be eaten, but Elsa gave her complements personally to the chef. Nathan ate his food in silence as he usually did. After a few minutes of devouring everything in front of him he looked up and saw Anna walking slowly towards him with a plate of food, yawning widely. Nathan stood to greet her as she drew up a seat at the table next to Elsa. Nathan broke his silence, saying to Anna "Happy that your friends are coming over?"

Elsa smirked at the question, thinking it was more something that would be asked of a small child than a fully grown royal. Anna looked at Nathan blankly for a moment, than her eyes open wide and she gasped. "Rapunzel is coming today! I totally forgot!"

Both Elsa and Nathan had a little laugh at that, taking enjoyment in Anna's absentmindedness. Elsa put a arm around Anna's shoulders and shook her in a playful way. "What would you do without us, sis?" she asked in an equally playful manner.

Anna looked down at her food, embarrassed, and said "I couldn't imagine." She started digging into her food and Elsa resumed digging into hers. Nathan shook his head in wonderment at the two's tolerance of each other.

"You know" he said to the both of them "most siblings can't stand even the sight of each other. How you two stand each other I'll never know. They both gave him a look that seemed to suggest they were sorry for him, and he didn't like it. "What? It's true. You twos relationship is weird." The pitiful looks they were giving him didn't stop, so he waver a hand and said "Forget I said anything."

Anna and Elsa looked at each other with a look that Nathan couldn't tell the meaning of, then returned to their food. Nathan finished off the last of his meal and stood from the table. "I've got to go take care of a few things." He said and walked off without waiting for a response.

He walked through the halls that were just starting to come to life. Various servants and servers were walking hurriedly, trying to get the morning chores done so they could have afternoon time off. One woman caught Nathans attention in particular. A woman who looked to be about forty or fifty, with shoulder length, curly black hair that had a few streaks of grey here and there. As Nathan passed her she glared at him with a hateful eye. He didn't particularly care what other people, especially servants, thought of him, but this woman had an air of power about her, like she intended to do something about her dislike of him.

He kept walking and considered following the woman, but decided against it. He had better things to do than stalk some old bat doing her job. He continued on to his room.

Nathan opened the door and stepped inside the small room. He took a moment to look around, searching for anything that was out of place or had been disturbed. He found nothing and continued about what he had been doing. He strode over to the table by the window and sat down, picking he small orb up off the table and examining it. He still knew very little about the strange object, but he had been able to fine out a few things. It contained energy, much like a bone charm. But instead of a bone charm's constant effect the orb was triggered by something. When it was triggered it let out a large amount of power and cast a spell. What spell the thing cast Nathan couldn't tell, but whatever it was it used the majority of the orbs power in one cast. The orb seemed to recharge its power slowly over time, as the glowing at its center grew brighter the longer it sat unused.

The thing had been quite the riddle for Nathan over the past three days. He had subjected it to every test he could think of, but it remained unchanged completely. Even throwing it against the hard stone of the courtyard had yielded no results. So discouraging was this lack of progress that he had considered throwing it into the sea. But as he looked at it now something seemed familiar. He couldn't place it, not exactly, but he had defiantly seen it before, and recently.

Racking his brain for what he had seen recently he looked out the window and out across the ocean. He saw a large ship, not a strange sight in a city like Arendelle. What was strange was the flag it was flying. It was a light purple background with a yellow sun in the middle. He recognized it as the symbol of the kingdom of Corona. He stood and placed the orb back on the table, the mystery would have to wait. The royals of Corona had arrived.

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Aouthors thing:

so i'm back! i may have been not posting, but i sure as hell have kept writing. to prove it i got four whole new chapters for all ya's.

remember to leave reviews and whatever.

Thanks!


	15. Chapter 15

Nathan made his way back towards the dining hall. The chances of Anna and Elsa still being there were low, but that was where he had last seen them, and he didn't feel like casting his shadow sense spell. The halls had cleared considerably, now that the morning chores were done and the duties of many were over.

He walked quickly, keeping his stride wide and frequent. He felt like he should be the first to tell Elsa that the royals had come. Part of it was some actual commitment and him feeling it was his duty, but another large part no doubt was that he wanted to beat the captain of the guard to it. The man had tried to show Nathan up at every opportunity he got, and Nathan was growing tired of it. It was childish and unprofessional. Therefor the best thing he could do was respond in kind. He look forwards to seeing the man's face with a stupid, confused look on it. But, he thought with a smile, that was the man's default expression.

He snickered briefly to himself at his own joke as he entered the hall. He looked over all the heads of people eating, looking for Elsa's distinctive platinum blond hair. Not seeing it, he turned his attention to Anna's red braids. Those stood out much less than Elsa's near white hair, but he thought he should be able to find them. After a few moments of looking he spotted Elsa's red hair. He made his way through the hall and came to Anna's side, tapping her on the shoulder.

She gasped and turned quickly in her seat. When she saw Nathan she let out a relived sigh and turned back to her plate of food, now almost completely empty. The said "If you're looking for Elsa she's gone. You kind of upset her."

Nathan gave her a confused look and asked "How did I offend her, exactly?"

Anna gave him a look like it should be obvious. "Elsa really hates being walked away from. It's one of the only things that can really get her mad."

Nathan felt his face grow cold. "Oh" he said in the voice of someone who realized they made a mistake. "well... do you at least know where she is? The royals from Corona are here."

Anna sprang out of her seat and grabbed for Nathans shoulders. He leaned back quickly and dodged what he assumed to be a hug. Anna didn't seem to notice that she had missed, as she turned away from him and made a sound that reminded Nathan of machined that were used to cut metal. She turned back to Nathan and said "Why didn't you tell me?" she shook in place and squealed "I can't believe it!"

Nathan shook his head and cleared his throat, saying "Anyways… can you tell me where Elsa is?"

Anna looked at him and stopped shaking. "Oh. Right. She said that she was going to the library."

Nathan nodded and said "Do you want to come with me?" he asked hopefully. He didn't want to face Elsa alone if he had really made her mad. Anna looked at him with a look that one would expect to be given to a toddler.

"You have to deal with her, I'm not getting involved." She said in a voice that Nathan knew he wouldn't be able to change. He took a deep breath and stepped back.

"Alright than, wish me luck." Anna smiled at him and waved. Nathan made a pleading face at her, but she just giggled and kept waving.

Nathan sighed and walked to the door to the dining hall. He wasn't especially looking forward to speaking to Elsa if she was annoyed with him. He had dealt with plenty of annoyed women over the course of his career, and he knew how… volatile they could be. He hoped that Elsa would be more patient than the women he was used to dealing with.

As he approached the door to the library he composed himself. His back straightened from its usual hunched position and he straightened his various bandoleers, bags, and belts. He took a deep breath and opened the door as quietly as he could.

He took a few tentative steps into the room and looked around cautiously. He couldn't see Elsa anywhere, and there was some small part of him that didn't want to look. He knew, though, that he had a job to do. He took a few more silent steps into the room and looked around again. Again he saw nothing.

He blinked cautiously to the top of a bookshelf and peered between the rows. Again, seeing nothing, he jumped to the top of the next shelf, peering down. Nothing. The stress of the situation was growing to ridiculous levels for just trying to both find and avoid her. He called out to her hesitantly "Elsa?"

Somewhere not too far away he heard Elsa answer "Nathan? What do you want?" in a flat voice. He almost cringed at the tone of her voice. She defiantly didn't sound happy.

He looked in the direction that her voice came from and craned his neck, searching for where Elsa was before he approached. He could only make out the end of her crystalline cape hanging off the end of a chair, but that was more than enough to tell him where she was. He focused and blinked about half the distance and swept up behind another chair. He looked cautiously out and saw her peering over the top of the seat she was in, looking out at the rest of the library for Nathan. He knew that now probably wasn't the time, but he couldn't help it.

He focused and blinked behind Elsa and pulsed his power. He then turned to find himself facing Elsa, who was positioned in the chair so that her knees were up on the seat. Nathan couldn't help but smirk at how ridiculous she look like this. He considered clearing his throat before he spoke, but decided against it.

He spoke out to Elsa, saying in almost a whisper "The royals from Corona are here."

Elsa gasped and jumped about a foot out of her seat. She turned quickly and said in an indignant voice "I do wish you would stop doing that!"

Nathan couldn't help but smile. He put a fist across his chest and said "Of course, queen." In a deep voice. He looked up from his bow and found Elsa looking at him with a very annoyed look on her face. He felt her gaze pierce into his very soul, and he straightened back up. "I really must apologize for earlier." He said sincerely. "I didn't know that you hated being walked away from so much."

Elsa sighed and said "I think I owe an apology as well. It just that…" she hesitated, obviously considering her words carefully. "…my mother and father loved me very much, and I can't even imagine what my life would've been like without them. It's just… hard to imagine that someone could go their entire life without someone caring for them like my parents did for me."

Nathan nodded, saying "thank you. You were born with your powers, right?" Elsa nodded and he continued "That must've been pretty bad, being a kid with all that…" he wave a hand. "…shit… going on. I'm glad I wasn't born with my power. I think I'd probably be dead by now if I was."

Elsa gave him a curious look and he shook his head. "Another story for another time, right now we need to prepare for the Corona royals, right?"

Elsa nodded and stood from her chair. She turned to the door and started walking. Nathan followed and said "So what are we going to do with them?"

Elsa shrugged and said "I really don't know. I guess it depends on what they say we need to do to get rid of whatever is sending stuff after me." She look out a window and stopped, looking at the sun. "It's early." She looked at Nathan and asked "You're sure that it was them?"

Nathan shrugged and said "I can't think of another reason a ship would be flying the Corona flag." Elsa nodded and tilted her head to try and see the ship. After a few moments of this she turned back to the walk and kept going. As Nathan passed the window he glanced out and confirmed that he couldn't see it from the angle given.

They walked down to the main doors to the castle and waited there. Nathan was about to ask what they were doing when he saw the captain of the guard approaching them. He was walking quickly, and had a wide grin on his face. Nathan crossed his arm and leaned up against the wall behind him. he thought he knew what the man was going to say, and Nathan wanted to see his face fall when Elsa told him she knew.

The man walked up to Elsa and bowed, saying "My queen" in a deeply respectful voice. He straightened up and turned to Nathan, saying curtly "Sir". Nathan scowled slightly at this. Nathan and Elsa had agreed that his title was Royal Protector, and Elsa had told the rest of the staff about him, so the captain referring to him still as sir was a little bit aggravating.

The captain drew up stake-straight and said to Elsa "Queen, the ship from-"

Elsa held up a hand, cutting him off. She said "From Corona, I know." She gestured to Nathan and said "Nathan here already told me." She gave a small smile to the man. The captain scowled a moment at Nathan before he realized that Elsa was still looking at him.

Elsa looked between the captain and Nathan with a concerned look. "Is… is everything alright between you two?"

The captain looked at Nathan with a stern look, than after a moment shook his head. "No m'lady. No problem at all."

Nathan gave the man a friendly smile and turned to Elsa. "See?" he said, spreading his arms. "Bestest friends!" he said in a joking tone.

As soon as his arm touched the man's shoulders, he said flatly "Don't touch me."

Nathan removed his arm quickly and said "Ok."

Elsa looked between the two and couldn't help but giggle a little bit. The captain of the guard looked at her with a tired looking frown, and Nathan smiled at her. One moment later Anna could he heard across the hall. She was dressed up in her winter attire and looked ready for a blizzard.

She came dashing across the hall, calling "Are they here? Is it time yet?" she came to a stop, skidding to just a few inches in front of Elsa.

Elsa smiled at Anna, turned to the captain of the guard and said "Well, is it time to go greet them?"

The captain smirked at Nathan and said "Yes, their ship has just docked. By the time you get down there they shuld just be disembarking."

Nathan pushed the door behind him open, letting a huge gust of cold air. Anna and the captain both closed their eyes and brought their arms in front of their faces, Nathan and Elsa didn't react to the sudden wind. Nathan stepped out into the cold and swept an arm out towards the main castle gate, sating "Well let's not keep them waiting, shall we?"

The two women walked out the door, and Nathan removed his body from the doors path, letting it fall closed. He turned to follow the women out when the door halted before it had hit the frame. Nathan turned to see what was obstructing it, and found the captain pushing it open.

The man gave Nathan a stern look as he opened the door and let it fall closed behind him. "I'm coming." He said in a stern voice. Nathan shrugged and continued following Anna and Elsa.

The walk to the docks was a fairly short one, taking only a few minutes. The quartet came up to the only docked ship that was flying a flag that didn't belong to Corona. There were a few large men unloading several large crates from the ship, and a few young couples standing on the deck of the ship looking out at Arendelle with wonderment in their eyes. Nathan wondered if one of the pairs could be the prince and princess of Corona, but he reminded himself that Anna would likely be going berserk if that was the case. So he waited to see what would happen next.

A few more couples streamed out from under the ship's deck, but given the lack of reaction from Anna Nathan concluded that none of them were the ones. He glanced sideways at Anna and observed her face. She was staring attentively at the ship, her eyes darting from face to face with dizzying speed. Every new person that emerged from the ship brought a new spark of hope to her eyes. After a moment of examining the new pair the spark fell away, but was replaced seconds later with a new one.

Nathan switched his gaze to Elsa's face. She was examining the ship much like Anna, but with a much more concerned expression. Nathan could see what she was worried about, it was clear enough. What if something had happened to them on the trip over? It was a concern that Nathan knew he shared somewhere, but if something had than he would have heard. Of all the people who knew how quickly news spread about royals Nathan might have known the most. After a few moments of looking at Elsa's face he switched to the captains.

Blank. Totally blank. Nathan smiled, knowing that the man couldn't care less about whether or not the royals from Corona had showed up. As long as Elsa and Anna were safe at the moment he was happy. "Like a dog." Nathan said to himself under his breath.

Nathan was startled by a sudden burst of noise from Anna. She started shouting and waving her arms around like a mad person. He looked to Elsa with a concerned look, and she just pointed to one of the couples standing on the deck. Nathan examined them as Anna dashed down the docks to be at the ramp as soon as it came down.

The girl looked to be about Elsa's age, around twenty or twenty-one. The man looked several years older. Something about the man's face seemed extremely familiar. Nathan could swear that he knew the man, but as hard as he tried he couldn't place him. He dismissed the feeling as unimportant and shifted his focus to the girl. She was garbed similarly to Anna, with heavy winter clothes and boots on. She didn't have any hat, though, so her short rather messily cut brown hair was free to hang at about shoulder length.

Nathans attention was again grabbed and Anna, whose exited yelling suddenly turned to a more panicked kind of scream. He turned to see what she was screaming about and saw her tipping over the side of the dock, about to fall into the icy water below. None of the loading crew were close enough to help her, so Nathan knew he had to do something. He considered using his link power, but was painfully aware of the fact the royals would likely see it. He didn't want them to be scared by his powers as so many other people had, so he decided to appear impossibly skilled rather than magic.

He bent his back leg and exploded off of it towards Anna, propelled by a strong wind. He moved much faster than he had any right to, given how little time he had to build the speed. He felt every eye snap onto him as soon as he started, but it was better than his blink giving him away. He stopped just short of Anna and grabbed the back of her collar, pulling her back up. She made a small gurgling sound as she righted herself than doubled over gasping. She looked up to Nathan and gave him a weak thumbs up, indicating she was ok.

Nathan gave her an awkward smile and looked around him at all the people staring at him. All the eyes on him made him feel extremely uncomfortable. He gave Elsa a desperate look, and she cried out to the people "Back to work!"

Nathan gave her an appreciative nod as the ramp to disembark was lowered from the ship and people started pouring off the ship. Anna rushed past him, almost knocking him into the freezing water. He steadied himself and looked to the ramp. Anna was embracing the two who were apparently the royals, and Elsa was trying to pry Anna off them. He walked up to the small group and said "Welcome!" in as friendly a voice as he could muster. They all turned to him and he suddenly realized that he would have to say more than just that. He put an arm up in the direction of the castle and said "Let's get out of the cold, shall we?"

To his relief, all of them nodded and started walking towards the castle. He felt extremely relived as he sunk back to the back of the group and followed them off. They started talking to one another and he listened in on their conversation.

Elsa was the first to speak, saying "I'm so glad you made it alright!"

The girl (Rapunzel, if Nathan remembered correctly) replied y saying "Yes, the ride was a little bit bumpy, but we made it in one piece." Nathan noticed how similar her voice was to Anna's. It was more high pitch, but quite similar regardless. She put a hand on the man's shoulder and said "I doubt we would've made it if not for Eugene here."

The man waved a hand dismissively and said "Ah, you're going to make me blush. It was nothing, really. The crew just needed a little help with their sails, that's all." He shrugged and kept walking.

Anna took Rapunzel's hand and said in a concerned voice "what happened?"

Rapunzel rolled her eyes and said "Oh, you should have seen him. He was like… like..." she gestured wildly, looking for the right word.

The man, Eugene, spoke up at this point, saying slyly "…a hero?"

Rapunzel gave him a loving look and said "A hero." Then she pushed her lips against his.

Nathan chose this moment to look out across the cold fjord. He saw once again a massive whale breach the surface of the water and look at him. He could feel the beasts eyes drilling into him, even from this great a distance. He didn't remember stopping to look at the whale, but before he knew it Elsa was tapping his shoulder and saying "Are you alright?" in a worried voice.

He shook his head, trying to clear his mind. "Yea, I'm fine." He said in as reassuring a voice as he could. She looked him over, than looked out at the whale, just disappearing under the water. She shook her head, obviously at a loss as to why Nathan cared so much about whales.

Nathan realized with a thankful sigh that they were at the castle gates. Maybe now he would be able to deal with what had been attacking Elsa all this time.


	16. Chapter 16

The five, Elsa, Anna, Nathan, Rapunzel, Eugene, and the captain of the guard, all found themselves in a large room huddled around a fire for warmth. Anna and Rapunzel were chatting excitedly to one-another about whatever it was that girls talk about. Nathan was eyeing Eugene's face out of the corner of his eye. He was sure he had seen the men before, he just couldn't place from where. Elsa was looking between the two, trying to determine why Nathan was so interested in the man. The captain of the guard was in the room simply because he was cold.

After some time of lounging around this room, chocolates and wine were brought in by a servant. Nathan had never cared much for either, but the girls all moved with surprising speed to the tray. While they were over there Eugene leaned up against a wall next to Nathan and said jokingly "Man, they moved almost as fast as you!"

It took Nathan a few moments to realize that he was talking about how Nathan had saved Anna at the docks. He nodded and smiled, hopping that he wasn't going to ask him any questions. He said "Yea, how about that, eh?"

Eugene clapped Nathan on the shoulder and said "You've got to show me how you did that!" loudly.

Nathan moved himself away from Eugene's hand and put a finger up to his lips and threw a cautious glance over in the women's direction. "As long as the girls don't know about it, alright."

Eugene looked over at Elsa with a confused look and whispered to Nathan "Why can't they know your showing me this?"

Nathan stopped and considered this. The fact was that Elsa and Anna would have absolutely nothing against him demonstrating his powers, and would actually probably encourage a demonstration. He didn't want all the attention that would come with a demonstration to everyone, but he did want to freak Eugene out, Mature? No, but it would e fun.

"Because…" his voice trailed off and he turned to Eugene. "Do you believe in magic?" he said, making his voice as ominous as he could.

Eugene smirked at this and cast his gaze back over to Rapunzel. "Yea, yea you could say that."

Nathan found himself very curious as to what Eugene had meant by that remark. He raised an eyebrow at him and asked with genuine interest "Care to explain?

Eugene smiled and said "Why not?" he took a seat in a large cushioned chair and motioned for Nathan to do the same. He said "It's something of a story, so you're going to want a seat." Nathan did as was requested and took a seat.

Eugene took a deep breath and started off on his story. "Well, it all started a few years ago i was… well I was a wanted thief. I was one of the best, no one could catch me." He looked rather pleased with himself. "After one of my better jobs I was on the run from the royal guards. I took a few wrong turns and ended up finding a tower deep in the woods. I climbed it, of course, being chased and all, and I thought I was alone." He stopped here to take another breath. "Well I wasn't. Turned out that the tower was Rapunzel's home. Now I didn't know it at the time, but Rapunzel had been kept cooped up in that tower her whole life, literally. She was being kept there by an old women, some crazy person called "Mother Gothel"." He stopped and snorted. "She was using Rapunzel's hair to stay young."

Nathan held up a hand and raised an eyebrow at this point. "Her hair?" he asked. "You can't be serious."

Eugene put his hands up and said "I know how bizarre it sounds, trust me. You know why I call her Blondie?" Nathan shook his head and Eugene smiled. "Her hair used to be about eighty feet long and golden blond."

Nathan shook his head. "No way." He said in a sure voice. "You're shitting me."

Eugene laughed, saying "No, it's true."

Nathan shook his head and said "Nope. I've believed some stupid stuff in my life, but I'm not buying that one."

A voice right next to Nathan's ear rang out, and he found that his first instinct was to throw an elbow at whatever it was. He turned his head faster than he threw an elbow, though, and was glad he did. He found Rapunzel looking down at him. He was able to pull his elbow in, but not stop it completely. It slammed loudly into the chair that Nathan was sitting in. Rapunzel gave him a concerned look and put a hand on his shoulder, saying "Are you alright?"

Nathan grimaced and drew his arm close and started nursing it. He nodded and said "That's not really true, is it? About your hair?"

She gave him a look that he couldn't quite place and said "of course it's true."

Nathan shook his head again. "Look, I just can't believe something like that without some proof." He pointed to Rapunzel's head. "If that was true than why is her hair short and brown?"

Eugene put his hands on his hips and said in a sarcastic voice "Well maybe if you would let me finish my story you would know that:"

Nathan made a wild gesture with his hands and ended it pointing at Eugene, indicating that he should continue. He laughed and did just that. "After I got up into the tower, I got knocked unconscious by Blondie and her frying pan." He pointed at Nathan and asked "Have you ever fought with a frying pan?" Nathan shook his head, and Eugene said "Well… let me tell you, it's just something else."

Nathan snorted. "Yea, getting into a sword fight with a brick would probably be "Something else" too, but it's not something that I'm particularly interested in."

Someone laughed next to him and he reacted much the same way he did the first time, throwing an elbow. He stopped himself, though, when he saw that it was Elsa who had laughed. His face once again twisted into a pained grimace as he nursed both arms at once, making for a rather stupid sight. Rapunzel put a hand on his shoulder again and asked "Are you sure you're alright?"

Nathan stood up from his seat and gestured to it, offering it to Rapunzel. She shook her head and he offered it to Elsa. To his relief she nodded and said "Thank you." and sat down. Nathan gladly stood a few feet away from the chair. Anything to get away from being touched so frequently

Eugene spoke loudly now, to get everyone's attention. "Anyways, as I was saying, I got up into her tower, and she knocked me out. When I came to I was tied down to a chair in her hair." Elsa and Anna gasped at this slightly. "I know, right? So I had something that I had stolen earlier, and she made me make a deal with her. She said that I had to take her to see the floating lanterns, it's a festival where they let thousands of lanterns into the sky. It was started by the king and queen when Gothel stole Rapunzel away from them. She said that if I got her to the festival and back to her tower, than I would get the crown back (The crown was what I stole, by the way.)

After some pretty crazy adventures I got her to the city. We danced and sang and drank…" his eyes seemed to fog over and he seemed to be looking far away. He shook his head and refocused on his audience. "We got out to some boats to get a better view of the lanterns, and we just kind of…" his voice trailed off and he looked to Rapunzel.

She spoke up, saying "Fell in love! After that I gave him the crown, and he said he had to take care of something. Later I found out that he had tried to give the crown to some people who had helped him steal it, but that Gothel had manipulated them into going for me, but Gothel double-crossed them to get my trust back. What I thought had happened was that he had taken the crown and ran away. I was taken back to my tower, and Eugene was taken to be executed. When I was at my tower I found out that I was the lost princess."

This got Nathan's eyebrows up again. He put up a hand and said "Wait, wait, wait. How did you realize this?" Anna and Elsa gave him a look that seemed to say "Stop questioning it", but Nathan refused.

Rapunzel looked at him with wonder in her eyes. She said in a kind of whimsical way "I don't know. It was just a kind of… revelation. I just looked at some things that I had painted and then it just… clicked."

There was a short moment of silence in the room before Eugene continued with his part of the story. "While she was in her tower having random moments of clarity, I was in prison. The guards were just starting to drag me off to be hanged when a group of guys I knew from a local bar got me out of it. After I got free I headed off to Rapunzel's tower as fast as I could. When I got there I called for her to let down her hair to let me up into the tower. Just when I thought she wasn't going too, down her hair came. I climbed up as fast as I could.

I got to the top, but Gothel was waiting for me. She stabbed me in the side, and I went down like a rock. Rapunzel offered something that I just couldn't believe at the time. She offered her life, she would serve Gothel forever, if she would let her heal me."

Again Nathan spoke up with a question. "Heal you? With her magic hair?" he snorted to himself and said under his breath "sounds like a fairytale."

Rapunzel gave Nathan a stern look and said "yes. With my hair. Now shut up, you're ruining the best part."

Nathan crossed his arms and went back to listening. "Gothel accepted her deal, but I couldn't. She came to heal me, but I had a shard of broken mirror ready. Right before she was able to heal me I grabbed her hair and cut it, making it lose all its power. Gothel just went…" he paused and seemed to think for a moment before saying "…hysterical. She started flailing around and screaming. Lucky for us she tripped over Rapunzel's cut hair, and fell out of the tower. Rapunzel and I made it back to the kingdom, and a few years later we married."

There was silence again for a few moments before a knock at the door made everyone jump. Anna jumped up to go and open the door. All the people in the room turned to see who had knocked, including Nathan. When the door opened Eugene and Rapunzel gasped loudly. He looked back at them than back to the door. It was the old woman that he had seen earlier. He didn't see what they were concerned about at first, than he saw the sickly green gas that was creeping along the floor with her.

Nathan shot to his feet, and everyone else followed. The woman made a wide gesture and spoke in a loud abrasive voice "Well, if I don't have the best timing!" she pointed to Eugene and Rapunzel and said "They were just telling you my story, were they?"

Nathan and the captain of the guard both drew their swords at the same time. They positioned themselves between the royals and struck a combative stance. The woman laughed and said "There's no need for that, gentlemen. "

With that, the green fog started rolling into the room and extending long smoky fingers that licked at their faces. The woman, Nathan assumed Gothel, started walking forwards. He and the captain both put their blades up in warning. The captain said, his voice quivering "I-if you d-don't l-l-leave immediately y-you with be d-dealt with h-harshly!"

Nathan snorted and said out of the corner of his mouth while keeping his gaze on Gothel "Very intimidating, good job."

Gothel laughed at this, then threw her arms up. The fog on the ground jumped up in columns and engulfed everyone's faces. Nathan, even though he had been prepared for such an attack, got about a half breath of the stuff.

It had the consistency of steam, but none of the heat. It had a choking taste and smelled like sulfur, but it wasn't the same kind of gas that he was attacked with the first time. He knew that he had to get out of the gas as soon as possible. He focused on a spot behind Gothel and pulsed his energy.

He spun around to face her, then put a hand to his head. His vision was swimming red, and his muscled ached to move. Rage filled his mind, he wanted to hurt, to maim, to kill something.

Somewhere in his mind a part that wasn't going berserk told him to look at the others who had been affected. He did, and saw Elsa screaming, Anna was tearing at the cushion if a seat, and Rapunzel was throwing punches at Eugene.

This had to stop. That much he was sure of. He could only think of one way to stop it right now.

He swiped at the woman with his blade. She spun quickly to face Nathan and laughed at him. this only made his blood boil more, and his swipes become more rapid and more wild. She dodged each swipe as fluently as if she was just a leaf in the breeze, as if she wasn't there at all.

Gradually Nathans slashes slowed and he felt his mind starting to gain traction against the rage inside him. He tried to think of what had saved him from the first time that this had happened conjuring the memory was hard, and he hadn't been killing anything, so it just sort of blended with everything else that had happened. But the solution had something to do with killing, that much Nathan was sure of. Was it one of his powers? Yes. It had to be. But which one?

Shadow form.

His mind still felt cloudy, but the answer came easily now. He focused his power and felt his body be consumed by darkness. It didn't clear his head like he had hoped it would, but it did give him the edge in his fight.

He threw his shadow body at Gothel and took great delight in the resounding scream that she gave. He felt his shadow wash over her, and positioned himself perfectly for a strike at her back. His flesh and blood reformed out of his shadow, and like a coiled spring he shot out. He saw the blade plunge into Gothel's flesh, but…

There was no resistance to the blade. What should have been blood was just another gas spraying out of the new wound. Nathan howled in frustration as Gothel turned to a cloud of gas. He swept the blade through the noxious cloud, hoping for some effect, but nothing happened. After a few swings at the cloud it started to float away out a nearby window.

He gave up trying to hit the cloud, it was clearly useless. He heard shouting from behind him and spun to see what it was. The sight that he found was one that not even he was really prepared for.

Elsa had Anna and Eugene pinned to a wall with spikes of ice jutting out from the ground. The thing that attracted most of Nathan's attention, though, was the captain. He was pinned to the wall in the same way the others were, with the exception of the fact that the spike that was keeping him on the wall was embedded in his gut.

Crimson rivulets were dripping down the spike slowly. Nathan found himself very deeply troubled. Not by the man currently nailed to the wall, but by Elsa. She was only inches from the man's face, and seemed to be… enjoying the man's pain immensely. She had such a bizarre smile that it gave Nathan goose bumps.

Elsa put a finger into the blood that was running down and then put the finger into her mouth. The look that fell across her face was the disturbingly similar to that she had gotten when she was eating chocolate. Nathan realized that the spike in the captain's gut was slowly growing larger.

Nathan didn't really like the captain, but he didn't deserve what was happening to him. Nathan focused (not an easy thing to do at the moment) and blinked right behind Elsa. He raised a hand cautiously, about to tap her shoulder, than thought better of it. If she was doing this to someone she had known for years than there would be nothing stopping her from turning on him.

Something occurred to Nathan, and he looked over at the others pinned to the wall. They were straining against the icicles that were holding them against the walls, screaming and cursing at Elsa. He looked back to Elsa with a feeling of horror. She had the others lined up, and was going to do the same to them as she was doing to the captain.

He wrapped his arm around Elsa's neck and pulled as hard as he could. As soon as his arm put pressure on Elsa's neck a huge gust of freezing wind blasted him in the face. He kept a tight grip and kept pulling, waiting for Elsa to go slack. As she struggled she threw an arm up, and Nathan felt a stabbing pain in his lower back. He looked down over his shoulder and saw a spike of ice jabbing into him.

Hurriedly he let Elsa go and focused his power. The spike stopped, Elsa stopped, even Nathan stopped. He cast his attention to the rafters far above, and pulsed his power. He knelt down and turned to look down at Elsa. She was looking around for him franticly, shouting insults and provocations in hoped of drawing Nathan out. It seemed that she was at least no longer set on killing the captain.

Nathan looked down at his new wound and cursed himself for being so careless. He put a hand to the puncture and got the blood on his glove. The blood was a bright red, and there wasn't too much of it. He gave a little thanks to whatever force in his brain had reacted so quickly and looked back down at Elsa. She didn't look like she was going to figure out where he was any time soon, so Nathan sat on his heels and watched he pace angrily around the room.

He cursed himself again. He should have known something like that would happen. He needed some way to disable Elsa first, before he went in to knock her out. He went through a mental list of his powers, and found nothing that would really work. He doubted that being attacked by his shadow would throw her much, and that was really Nathan's only power that would act directly on someone. He sighed in frustration and dug into his pockets, looking for anything that would help him.

He pulled out a single rune and turned it over in his hands, considering possibilities. He shut his eyes tight and focused what he could of his mind on the energy in the rune. The shadowy power of the bone drew him into the void, and he harnessed the power around him. He molded the shadow into a ball and thought again about what he needed to do. His brain ached from all the thinking he was doing, but he shook his head and kept going.

He looked again at the ball, and considered what this simple shape would do. As far as he could tell it would simply create an orb of darkness. He considered the effects of this, and actually found himself favoring the simplicity of the spell. The simple shape would mean it would have a very low energy cost, and the effect it had would make the spell very effective. He thought about what he could add to it to make it more effective. He drew power from the other runes he had and added them to the ball, making it much larger while keeping a low energy requirement. He added a few layers to the all that would allow limited control over the orb when it was out, and put all of his remaining runes but two into the spell, figuring he wouldn't have much use for them if he failed this.

He sealed the spell, and felt the power of the runes burn into the shape he had made. As soon as the last rune's power was gone his mind felt like it was shot out of the void and back into his body.

He was again on the rafters above Elsa, sitting on his heels and watching her. She was starting to turn the room upside-down, casting chairs and curtains aside looking for him. he smirked to himself and said to himself under his breath "They never look up."

He stood up and stretched his back. After it popped sever times he drew his left hand up to eye level and slowly funneled power into his new spell. It started as a small thing, a little marble sized ball of darkness, but as Nathan put more power into it grew to about palm size. He felt the spell reach its capacity for power put in, and cut of the flow of energy.

He gave the thing one last look as he drew it back behind his head. It was absolutely dark, no light was in the space of darkness. Nathan wondered why he hadn't thought of this spell sooner, and whipped the little ball as hard as he could at Elsa. It traveled through the air straight at her, unaffected by either gravity or the mighty winds Elsa was conjuring. As soon as it made contact with Elsa it expanded to engulf her completely. Nathan felt some small connection to the ball form in his mind, and he flexed it experimentally like a new muscle. The orb responded by growing and shrinking its size according to how he manipulated the link.

He expanded it to about the size of being able to fit around five people across inside it and found that, just as he would expect of an orb, the top expanded to almost touch the ceiling. He heard Elsa shout in both fright and frustration. A few spikes of ice erupted from inside the black sphere, but they didn't hit anything and stopped moments after their creation.

Nathan looked around the room now for anything that could give him away on his approach. There wasn't much left in its original place, most of the furniture had been lasted to the outer edges of the room by Elsa. He didn't see anything, so he dropped down from his perch and met the fall with bent knees.

He strode calmly towards the orb of darkness and flipped his sword around so that the blade was point down. He put a small bit of power into his shadow-sense and felt the orb light with information. He stepped into the ball of darkness and walked to Elsa, who was stumbling through the dark and flailing, panicking at the sudden loss of sight. He crouched down and took each step lightly to avoid making too much noise. He drew up behind Elsa and readied his blade. He brought the hilt of the sword crashing into Elsa's temple with enough force to make even him cringe.

Elsa's body crumpled to the floor, unconscious. Nathan raised his hand and waved it, making the huge ball of shadow dissolve into nothing. The screaming of Anna, Eugene, and Rapunzel stopped for a moment as they took in the sight of Elsa at Nathan's feet before resuming a second later. Nathan took Elsa over his shoulder and strode over to the captain of the guard.

His breathing was shallow and his face was very pale. The blood that was still leaking from his gut was a dark red, almost black. Nathan considered what he could do for the man and came to the conclusion that all he could do was let someone else try and fix him. He brought his blade against the spike keeping him on the wall, and the captain's body fell like a ragdoll to the floor. The spike was still embedded in his gut, Nathan knew that removing that would only speed the man's death. He set Elsa down on the floor and took the captain up instead.

As soon as the man was in his grip he blinked to the other side of the room and kicked the doors open. He bellowed at the top of his lungs "Guards!" and waited for some response. Sure enough, the thundering footsteps of many boots came from a side hall, and six men came into view. They all saw the captain in Nathan's arms and gave Nathan a fearful look. He held the captain out to one of the men and said "Get him to a medic." In a solemn voice. The man who took him nodded and went running off through the corridors. Nathan turned to the rest of the men and motioned for them to follow him.

He led the men to the area where Elsa was unconscious on the floor and the others were still bound to the wall. He motioned to Elsa and said "Get her somewhere safe, and lock her up. Don't let her out, no matter what she says, until I come retrieve her." One of the men nodded and took Elsa in a careful hold before walking quickly out of the room. The other men simply looked at Nathan with confused and worried expressions. Nathan just scowled and turned away, turning his attention back to the others still pinned to the wall.

He didn't particularly want to just club them over the head as he did Elsa, but he didn't see much in the way of other options. Now that he had time, though, he put some serious thought into it. He cringed when he realized that the answer was painfully obvious. He sighed in frustration as he drew his crossbow from his belt. One of the guards still lingering in the room put himself between Nathan and those pinned to the wall. For a moment Nathan thought the man intended to fight him, until he realized what he must be thinking.

Nathan pulled the bolt out of the track on the crossbow and reached into a pocket, withdrawing a much smaller dart. The end of the dart was coated in a wet, slimy looking substance. Nathan handled the dart with care, taking special precautions with the poisoned tip. He loaded the dart into the bow and leaned to the side of the man in front of him, shooting at the closest pinned person, who happened to be Anna.

The dart stuck in the side of her neck, and Nathan knew the poison would take only seconds to work with such a perfect shot. Anna struggled for a few moments before she went limp. Nathan pushed past the man in front of him and brought his blade against the ice keeping her pinned to the wall. He caught her as she fell, preventing her from slamming her head into the floor. He handed the unconscious Anna to the man, saying "Same as Elsa." Before turning to the other two pinned to the wall and loaded another dart into his crossbow.

The same was done to Rapunzel and Eugene, and Nathan put his crossbow back on his belt. He turned to the last guard and said "lock down the castle. I want guards everywhere, checking everything." The man nodded and went running off through the halls.

Nathan turned back to the wrecked room and heaved a heavy sigh. Gothel could still be around, and his head was mostly clear. There was no chance of him falling asleep after that, so he decided that he would join some of the guards on their patrols. He wanted to e sure that Gothel was gone, and he had a feeling that his shadow sense was the only reliable way to do that.

He walk wearily out of the ruined room and started putting power into his shadow sense spell.

.

.

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Goddammit this chapter was so close to five thousand words.


	17. Chapter 17

"Nathan, you never cease to be interesting, do you?"

Nathan peered blearily around him. He wasn't in his bed, that was for sure. He was standing in the middle of a large room that had large windows on one wall. Two small children were off to one side, frozen in time. They looked remarkably like…

"Yes, Elsa and Anna." the Outsider kept speaking "There was once a time when they did this quite frequently. But now they sit in their library, talking and reading. Strange, isn't it? How the older you grow the less fun you seem to have."

Nathan walked closer to the kids. Elsa was casting magic on the ground, and Anna was jumping from one pile of snow to another. Elsa had a very worried look on her face, and looked like she had been frozen mid-sentence. Anna, on the other hand, looked like she didn't have a care in the world. Nathan wondered why Elsa looked so frightened when Anna appeared so happy.

"You remember when I told you Elsa thought herself cursed for some time, but you are curious when this feeling started in her." Nathan couldn't help but agree. He had given the matter some thought and had only come up with vague ideas of what caused her outlook on her powers. He could guess that it had something to do with the scene the outsider was showing him, though.

Slowly, the scene came to life. Anna slowly left the pile of snow she was on and moved through the air to land on the next one. Elsa shot magic at the ground to make another pile for Anna to jump to. She slowly seemed to lose her balance and fall to the floor. Anna didn't notice and kept jumping. Elsa hurriedly scrambled up and shot a desperate bolt of magic.

The bolt wasn't aimed, though, and Nathan could tell what was about to happen. At an excruciatingly slow pace, the bold made its way through the air and collided with Anna's head. As soon as the magic made contact with Anna, everything stopped again. Anna had a pained look on her face, and Elsa looked totally panicked.

Nathan would've felt sad for her, if it hadn't already happened. His pity wouldn't change anything, this had all already happened. Nothing could change that. He turned sideways to the outsider and gave him a questioning look. Why was he showing him all this?

The outsider seemed to smirk at Nathans unasked question. He leaned back, and the scene around Nathan melted away into another.

Nathan found himself in another place. He was standing in a room with a single bed and a small bookshelf or two. The major thing that Nathan noticed, though, was the layer of frost that covered everything. It took him a moment to process, but eventually he came to the conclusion that this must have been Elsa's room. As if to confirm this, he saw Elsa sitting on the floor with her head resting on her knees. He could see tears streaming down his face and her back raising and lowering in random spasms that he knew was crying. Nathan looked to the outsider for an explanation.

"Elsa didn't take the news of her parents' death very well. She locked herself in her room, and didn't come out for days. The ruling staff had to take over at this point, due both to the fact that she was emotionally unfit to rule and that she was not yet old enough to take the throne." The Outsider looked to Elsa crying on the floor and said "she spent days like this. Doing nothing but crying. She attempted suicide twice in that time."

Nathan looked up at the Outsider, quite surprised. It was very strange to hear this information in the Outsider's flat monotone voice. He didn't know why he expected anything but that, though. He had never heard the Outsider speak with even a hint of emotion.

He looked back to the softly sobbing Elsa on the ground and wondered how she had tried to kill herself. As if in answer to this question, the scene shifted slightly. Elsa was standing in the open windowsill and looking down. Her breathing was deep and quick. Nathan knew that if she kept breathing like that she would hyperventilate. She had a strange look in her eyes. It was like she was half in turmoil and half completely at peace with what she was about to do.

Nathan stepped over next to her at the window and looked down. The ground was about three stories down, enough to do some major damage, but not enough to kill if she stayed upright. He looked sideways at Elsa and, even though he knew she wouldn't jump, he wanted to speak some comfort to her. She just looked so... broken.

Her breathing got even heavier for a moment and she put one foot out of the window. Than her breathing got very shallow, her eyes rolled back in her head, and she fell back. Her head hit the wooden floor with a thud, and Nathan let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding.

The scene shifted again, and Elsa was sitting on the floor next to her bed with a razor sitting next to her. Nathan eyed the blade with an unsure look. Elsa took a deep breath and grabbed the razor without looking at it. She held it in a shaky grip, and it almost fell out of her hands several times. She brought the lade up to eye level and slid one sleeve down and brought the knife to rest on her bear skin.

Nathan noted that the place she was going to cut didn't have enough blood flow to bleed her to death. The most it would do was hurt. She dragged the blade across her milky skin, and crimson beads started welling up out of the cut. Tears started flowing from Elsa's eyes and she brought the razor to the other arm, doing the same to that arm.

When she finished she threw the razor to the other side of the room where it clattered to the ground. A little spot of blood was left where the razor hit the wall. It dripped down slowly, and Elsa curled into the fetal position on the ground, bawling.

Nathan looked down sadly at the crying Elsa on the ground. The Outsider spoke, saying "She tried this once. After this her servants had to come and clean the blood from the floors. She never told them where it came from, but they knew where it came from, and she knew they knew. Those servants still work here. They avoid Elsa's gaze when she speaks to them. They are afraid that if they ever tell anyone they will be punished."

Nathan looked at the cuts on Elsa's arm. They weren't very deep, but they were defiantly deep enough to scar. He wondered if the scars were still there. The Outsider spoke again "Of course Elsa isn't the only one who has undergone such hardships. Anna has gone through similar hardships, but they never got as bad as Elsa's. She is a naturally happy person, so depression didn't have quite so much of a hold on her. She got over her parents death in weeks, rather than Elsa's months."

Nathan was about to ask the Outsider why he was showing him all this. He didn't really see any point to it. Than he opened his eyes.

The sun was blazing through his window into his eyes, and the knocking at his door was getting louder. He threw his legs over the side of the bed and heaved a heavy sigh.

"What is it?" he spat irritably at the door.

A voice said from the other side "Queen Elsa wants to talk to you."

.

Elsa drew a sharp breath and looked around her. She was somewhere she didn't recognize. It was a rundown looking building that looked hardly habitable. The room was dark, but there was a light coming from behind her. She spun to see what it was coming from and gasped when she saw a small group of kids huddled around what looked like a pile of burning trash.

She ran over to them, calling out to them as she went. She reached them and knelt down next to one, asking "Are you alright?" but the child just kept staring into the flames as if he hadn't heard her. In fact… not that she looked, none of the kids were moving. They all seemed frozen in place, as if some bizarre force had simply called time to a halt. She looked to the fire, and found that not even that was moving.

A monotone voice rang out from the silence. It said "Hello again, Elsa."

Elsa gasped and fell away from the direction the voice came from. She looked around frantically but didn't find anything. Then, as if from nowhere, a man appeared floating just above the flames. He looked down at Elsa and cocked his head like he was puzzled at her reaction. He spread his arms and said "did I startle you? That was not my intention, believe me."

Elsa narrowed her eyes and shook her head. "Why?" she asked "Why should I trust you?"

The man smiled, like she had asked a question that had such an obvious answer that it was painful. He folded his arms again and said "I suppose you don't have to, but what other choice do you really have? What cause have you to not trust me?" he leaned forward and said in a knowing voice "I've never lied to you before, Elsa."

Elsa looked down. She didn't really have any reason not to trust him. And he had never lied to her before, that was true. She looked back up to the floating man and waited for what he would say next.

He smirked again, like he knew what she had just thought, and leaned back out. He gestured to the kids sitting around the fire and asked "Do you know who these are, Elsa?"

She shook her head and said "No… I have no idea."

The Outsider cocked his head again and said in a matter-of-fact voice "But you do. You know two of them." He pointed to one of the boys. He was huddled close to the fire, and looked like he was talking to several of the others. "Rapunzel's husband." He said "Eugene Fitzherbert."

Elsa stepped closer. He looked like he was in the middle of a story, frozen in the middle of some kind of gesture. Elsa looked him over. He was covered in dirt, and looked thin, almost to the point of being malnourished.

The Outsider pointed to another boy, one that Elsa hadn't even seen. He was short, with dark hair and sunken eyes. Elsa recognized Nathan, even years before current times. He looked much older than most of the other kids. He was looking towards the fire with a yearning expression, holding himself and looking very cold. Elsa wondered why he didn't just walk over to the fire and warm up.

Then she saw the bloody knife at his side. The room melted away, and was replaced by a dank looking alleyway. Elsa looked around her, and found more people frozen in time. It was Nathan again, this time in the middle of an action. The action, as it turned out, was jabbing a small knife into the throat of a wealthy looking man. She gasped when she saw it, and the Outsider spoke again.

"He told you that he started stealing to get food for the other children, and he didn't lie, but that's not all he did. His roots as an assassin stretch further than he would have you believe." Elsa looked up at the Outsider with confusion in her eyes. "The first person Nathan killed was another orphan, only two years older than him. He did it as both an act of self-defense, and as a means to secure food and shelter for other kids as much as himself." The Outsider looked over at Nathan and said "He hasn't stopped killing since. Not really. There may have been brief interludes between each death he caused, but it never really stopped." he looked back at Elsa and said "Yes, Nathan's past is a rather bloody one."

The alleyway melted away, and Elsa found herself standing on a small wooden platform surrounded by sheer nothingness. The outsider was hovering a few feet in front of her, looking expectantly at her. He said "Have you ever killed anyone, Elsa?"

She shook her head, unable to speak. The Outsider smirked again, and said "That time may come sooner than you think, Elsa."

With that everything faded to black. Elsa frantically flailed and blinked, trying to ring back her sight. When it did come, she found herself staring at a grey stone ceiling. She sat up on the uncomfortable shelf and looked around her. She was in a cell.

She looked down and saw the same kind of shackles on her hands as the time that she had been captured by Hans. She wondered why she was put in a cell, and tried to think back to what had happened. Some witch had opened the door… Nathan stepped forward… everything after that was just a blank. A pounding pain erupted in the side of her head and she clutched it, gasping. She called out to the door "H-hello? Is anyone there?"

She heard a crackling, and looked down to see a thin layer of frost forming over her shackles.

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Again, remember to leave some review or that kind of thing if you want.

Thanks again for reading all this! it really means a lot to me.


	18. Chapter 18

Nathan was glad in some small way that he had cast shadow step on Elsa before he went to sleep. It meant that he wouldn't have to make the long walk down to the dungeons. He gathered his gear and put it all on, ready for anything. As he got ready to cast the spell he drew his blade. "No such thing as too careful" he said to himself idly before pouring power into the spell.

His shadow jumped up from the ground and made a gate. Nathan stepped through it confidently, and fount the trip much more pleasant than the first time had had taken it. After a brief moment of sensory deprivation he found himself standing in a dank dark cell. He found the change jarring, but felt more comfortable in the darkness than he did in his bright room.

A rattling behind him prompted to do a quick turn and raise his blade ever so slightly. He found Elsa on her feet just inches away from him. The chains on her shackled were pulled taught, and she was straining against them, her eyes shut with effort. He took a small jump back and felt his back hit up against the cold stone wall with a quiet thud.

Elsa heard this and opened her eyes. She saw Nathan and stopped straining against the chains. "Nathan" she said in a panicked voice "what's going on? Where is Anna and everyone else?"

Nathan looked past Elsa and saw the bed that she had been placed on. It was covered in a thick layer of ice, and it seemed to be creeping up off the bed and on to the wall. He looked back at her and examined her worried expression carefully. It was clear that the cruel air that she had been giving off last night was gone, replaced entirely by concern for the people she had almost murdered.

Nathan sighed and sheathed his blade. Elsa, who didn't seem to have noticed the sword, flinched when she saw it, but seemed relieved when he sheathed it. Nathan motioned to the bed, indicating that she should take a seat. She did and he started pacing from one side of the small cell to the other.

"Well…" how did one explain that you had almost killed your best friends? He started again, saying "You… sort of…" Elsa was looking at him eagerly, waiting to hear what had happened. Nathan took a deep breath and started over. "You remember the captain of the guard?" he instantly felt the urge to hit himself. Remember? Why the hell had he said that?

Elsa's face darkened, and she said "What do you mean "Remember"? What happened to him?" Nathan felt the air in the room plummet in temperature. He let out a deep breath, and looked at the white mist that exited his mouth. The ice on the bed behind Elsa cracked and creaked as if made its way further up the wall.

Nathan decided that there was no point to beating around the bush. "You kind of… injured him quite badly." Elsa looked down and looked on the edge of tears. "You didn't kill him!" Nathan said quickly, than hesitantly followed with "But he's not doing too well."

Elsa peered up to Nathan with a confused look and asked "Why?" in a hurt voice.

Nathan shrugged and said "Some kind of magic that Gothel used to send us into a rage. I didn't get all of it, so I had the clarity to go for her. But you, having your powers, just kind of" Nathan waved an arm to indicate how easily she had swept the others away "beat them. Although for some reason you didn't just turn to mindless rage." He considered something that hadn't really occurred to him before. "You were much more…" his voice trailed off as he realized that if he told her exactly what she had done and how cruel she had been she would probably have a breakdown.

Elsa gazed expectantly at Nathan, waiting for him to finish his sentence. He continued slowly and carefully. "…you were much more powerful and skilled in combat, allowing you to dominate them with ease."

Elsa nodded, it made sense after all. Her powers would let her overpower nearly anyone if she really tried. "Did I hurt anyone else?" she asked as a new wave of concern washed over her.

Nathan smiled and said "No, I was able to knock you out before that happened."

Elsa put a hand to her forehead and said "That would explain the headache."

Nathan smirked and leaned back against the wall. It seemed she was totally free of the effects of the gas, so it should be safe to let her out. He was about to suggest this to her when there was a knock at the door. Both Elsa and Nathan looked over to the door, and Nathan strode towards it.

A small slit in the door slid open and a pair of green eyes Nathan didn't recognize stared through at him. a nervous voice came through the slot and said "Royal Protector, we umm… can you step out here a moment?"

Nathan exchanged a puzzled look with Elsa before turning back to the door and nodding. The door slid open and Nathan stepped out. Two royal guards were standing outside the door shuffling uncomfortably. As Nathan left the cell one closed the door behind him and slid the little slot shut. Nathan crossed his arms and leaned up against the door and said "Yes?"

The two looked at each other nervously before one said "We were sent to tell you… that… the captain is dead."

Nathan was about to respond when the door he was leaning on exploded off of its hinges. He was knocked to the ground as the door fell on top of him. He heard the two men shout in surprise and run off. He shouted a curse at them as they ran off but they didn't stop. He turned his body under the door and pushed it up, off of him.

He kicked the door up and scrambled out from beneath it. It fell back to the stone ground and made a loud crash as it hit. Nathan saw a thick wall of ice flowing over the empty frame, blocking off Elsa's cell. He cast the first spell he could think of at the door. A small snake of his shadow shot out of Nathans hand and went skittering in through the door just as the ice sealed it off. Nathan felt his shadow like with Elsa's and breathed a small sigh of relief.

It seemed that Elsa's magic had stopped, so Nathan approached the icy barrier and tapped on it with a knuckle. He called out "Elsa! Are you alright?" than put an ear to the ice.

All he could hear was sobbing. It sounded very similar to the crying he had heard from her in the vision the Outsider had shown him. He pulled his head away from the ice and stepped back. He had to calm her down, but he doubted his own ability to do so. Something he didn't doubt, though, was Anna's ability.

He set off at a sprint through the dank halls, searching for any guards. He came to the exit to the dungeon and found one man posted at the door. He skidded to a stop and addressed the man. "Where is Princess Anna being held?"

The man pointed to a door further down the hall that had another guard posted in front of it. He sprinted over and said "Open the door."

The guard looked at Nathan with a puzzled expression, saying "but you said…"

Nathan shoved the man out of the way and threw the door open. He found Anna in a small cell that was separated from two other cells by a thin wall of bars. He quickly tried the door and found it locked. He sighed in frustration and ran out of the room again.

He snatched the keys off of the guard's belt as the man was picking himself off the floor, muttering to himself. He didn't seem to notice, so Nathan returned to Anna's cell and shoved the key in the lock.

The door creaked open and Nathan squeezed inside before it had opened even halfway. He knelt down over the unconscious Anna and said loudly "Anna! Anna you have to wake up!" she stirred, but settled back down on the floor. Nathan shook her and said "Elsa really needs your help!"

This got her attention, and her eyes shot open. She sat up quickly and smacked her forehead into Nathans face. Nathan jerked back, but wasn't fast enough to avoid the hit. Anna put a hand to her forehead and Nathan pinched his nose. Blood started flowing from Nathans nose and he leaned his head back.

Anna apologized "Oh, oh sorry! I didn't… sorry."

Nathan held up a bloody hand and said "No, it's alright." He got to his feet and said "come on, we have to help Elsa." Anna got to her feet as well, and the two set off at the quick jog.

The two reached Elsa's cell, and Anna leaned up against the ice. "Elsa, Elsa come out!"

A voice, muffled by the wall in the way, came out "No, I don't want to hurt you!"

Anna threw herself against the ice and shouted "Elsa, we can help you control it, please!"

Nathan saw that this back and forth would be going nowhere, so he decided to interject here. "Elsa, you only did what you did because you were under the influence of a spell. No one will lame you for what you did, you were bewitched!"

The crying stopped, and Elsa's voice came through saying "R-really?"

Anna looked back at Nathan and smiled, grateful for his help. She said "Yea, if anything this will get people rallied against Gothel."

The wall of ice came down slowly. Anna was looking in hopefully and Nathan put a hand on the hilt of his blade cautiously. As soon as there was enough room in the ice, Anna ran through. Nathan followed, still prepared for anything.

As soon as he entered he let his hand fall to his side. Anna and Elsa were hugging in the middle of the cell. Elsa didn't look very good. Her eyes were puffy and red, her hair was messy and out of its usual order, and she was shaking profusely. Anna was putting Elsa's face into her shoulder and patting her head, whispering "It's of, it's ok." to her in a soft voice.

Nathan looked around the room. It was now almost completely covered in a thick layer of frost. The air in the cell was at most half that of the already cold dungeon. Elsa's shackles lay shattered on the ground, twisted and crumpled like they had turned to paper for Elsa to just tear off.

Elsa looked up from Anna's shoulder and said to Nathan "I want t-to see him."

Nathan turned back to them and said "I… I don't think that's a good-"

She cut him off, pushing Anna away slightly and saying resolutely "I want to see him."

Nathan looked to Anna for help. She gave him a sorry shrug and mouthed the words "I don't know". Nathan looked back to Elsa and imagined all the things that could go wrong. Two days ago he would've thought that he could deal with whatever happened, but given what he had seen her do last night…

"Elsa…" he started "…my job is to protect you and Anna." She started to speak but he rose his voice slightly and cut her off "And you demonstrated last night that you have the capacity to inflict immense damage. Now last night you were being manipulated, bewitched, into hurting others. But the fact remains that you can still do that." Elsa looked down at the floor and tears began to well in her eyes. "I have seen your powers… act up when you are…" he searched for the right way to say it "emotionally compromised." She looked back up at him and sniffled. "If you see that corpse, I don't only think, I know that you will react strongly" he stepped forwards and took her hand to emphasize his point and said "because you love." She looked up at him and got a puzzled expression. He continued talking "You loved that man. Maybe not with a romantic love, but you cared for him deeply." He looked right into her eyes and said "If you see him, you will react."

Elsa starred back at him and Nathan saw a determined fire blaze in her eyes. "I will control it." she said in a deadly serious voice "I will control it, and I will" she said emphasizing the word will "see that body."

Nathan let go and stepped back. She was standing strongly now, with her fists clenched and her breath deep. Nathan knew now that there was no way to dissuade her from seeing the corpse, so he may as well be there to offer what comfort he could. "Very well." He said in a defeated voice. Elsa got a small smile on her face, and Anna gave Nathan a puzzled, worried look. Elsa started walking to the door but Nathan put himself between it and her. "But you go on one condition."

Elsa rolled her eyes and said impatiently "What?"

Nathan put out an open hand and said "You do what I say, when I say it. If I say leave, you bolt." He put his hand out a little farther. "Deal?"

Elsa looked at him with a hard expression for a moment, then saw the seriousness on his face. Her hard look cracked and she hurriedly took his hand and shook. He nodded and moved from the door, allowing her through. She walked through quickly, leaving Anna and Nathan alone in the cell. Nathan turned to Anna and sighed, saying "Well, come on then." before turning and following Elsa.

As he passed the guard by the door he said "Let the others out their cells as well." The man nodded and walked off in another direction.

When they came to the morgue Nathan found Elsa leaning on the door, breathing deeply. He came up behind her and said cautiously "are you alright?"

She gave a weak little laugh and said "What do you think?"

Anna came up behind Nathan and waited to see what would happen. Nathan was about to say that they should leave, when Elsa pushed the door open. Nathan smelled the blood as soon as the door opened. Elsa took a deep breath and walked in. Nathan followed behind her.

The body was laying on a wooden table in the center of the room. It was still dressed in the captain's clothes, and the gaping tear in the gut was much more obvious than Nathan had been hoping it would be. Elsa's breathing started to get quick again, and Nathan considered telling her to leave. He didn't, though. He may as well just let her grieve in peace.

She lifted the edge around the wound and looked in. A horrified expression erupted on her face and she stumbled back, falling to her knees. Anna was by her side in an instant to whisper comforts and reassurances in her ear.

Nathan wondered what she had seen that would frighten her so much. He walked to the body and lifted the fabric the same way she had. Then he saw what had frightened Elsa. The man's insides were almost completely shredded, and among them were small pieces of ice, still not melted.

The part of Nathans brain that possessed medical knowledge recoiled as it realized what would inflict damage like this. The spike that had stuck the man to the wall must have been… rotating. In combination with the spikes that Nathan could see still embedded…

Nathan shuddered as he imagined what that must have felt like. Ones organs being so thoroughly destroyed? If he didn't know better, he would've thought that the man had been caught in some industrial machinery. He looked back at Elsa, unable to wrap his head around how she would even entertain this thought, let alone use it. Even he, under the effect of Gothel's spell, hadn't become so vicious. He had become angry, but it seemed Elsa had become something else entirely. He wondered what had been different between them.

He had had met a few of the medical staff, and they hadn't really impressed him. They didn't seem like very skilled medics. But now, knowing they had kept the man alive until this morning, he had a new respect for them. He looked over the rest of the body and noted that they had done a very good job of cleaning it up.

He noticed that the room had grown much colder than it had been when he entered. He looked back at Elsa and saw a light dusting of snow beginning to swirl around Elsa and Anna. Anna was looking at Nathan with a worried expression, and Elsa was starting to breathe more heavily. Anna was still whispering to Elsa, but Elsa was clearly not hearing her.

After a moment Elsa pushed Anna away and stood. She gave a panicked look to Nathan and said "I can't…" her voice trailed off, drown out by a sudden howling wind in the room. Elsa motioned to Nathan that he should get Anna out of the room. He nodded and took a step towards her.

The wind doubled, and Nathan stumbled, catching himself on the table the body was laying on. Anna has clutching Elsa's shoulders yelling something, but the howling wind choked out everything she said. Elsa was screaming back trying to warn Anna but she refused to leave her.

Nathan braced himself and stepped forward. The wind felt like a whole solid object, pushing and battering him relentlessly. He knew that trying to walk in such a torrent would not work. He focused his mind on a spot behind Anna and pulsed his power for a blink.

The spell worked, and he turned to grab Anna. He grabbed her by the shoulders and gave a hearty pull. She resisted though, swinging one arm at Nathan while holding fast to Elsa with the other. Nathan looked desperately to Elsa for help, but her eyes were squeezed shut and her mouth was moving, talking to herself.

Nathan readjusted his grip so that he had a fistful of the collar of her shirt and gave one last pull, putting all of his strength and weight into it. He saw Anna's eyes bulge out and the hand on Elsa went to her neck. He felt kind of ad about choking her like this, but Elsa was clearly not stable.

Now that Anna was not holding onto Elsa, Nathan was free to get her out of there. He blinked as quickly as he could out of the room and pushed Anna out of the direct line with Elsa through the door. She tumbled to the ground, and Nathan turned back to Elsa.

She was on her knees cradling her head like there was a massive pressure pushing on her mind. Nathan tried shouting again, but the words died as soon as they left his mouth.

His mind went to his crossbow. He still had a few sleep darts, but he doubted his ability to make the shot through the wind.

Then, as soon as it had started, the wind stopped. Elsa looked up and her hands fell to her side. Nathan called out to her, saying "Elsa! Are you alright?"

She looked up at him with an expression that projected so much fear that he couldn't help but feel his knees start quaking a little bit. Anna was up by this point, and tried to push past him. She was screaming "Elsa, Elsa are you alright? Elsa!"

Elsa's eyes flicked from Nathan to Anna, then suddenly her whole body tensed. Nathan felt something, raw power, emanating from her body. It was like a massive wave, barely contained and threatening to break through. Nathan's eyes widened as he realized the danger she was trying to keep back.

Than Elsa started screaming. It was a guttural scream that sounded like it was tearing her throat apart. Nathan realized what was about to happen, and shoved Anna to the floor again. He then returned his attention to Elsa. He was looking at her just long enough to see a blast of crystalline blue energy shoot out of her mouth. This seemed to strengthen the power of her scream, as it grew louder and all the more horrible.

Than the wave broke. Elsa's body shuttered and her pure power shredded its way out of her control. Nathan felt the magic rippling through the air just a moment before it impacted him.

His mind had time to realize several things in the time it took his body to be blasted against the wall behind him. The first was that the force of the blast was not as much as he had been expecting, what he had expected was something that would break a few of his bones on impact, but the wave that hit him was just enough to send him flying and nothing more. The second thing was that he was now extremely cold, and that the cold of this blast could still very well damage him. The third thing that he realized was that he had saved Anna from the blast. And the last thing he realized was that he could feel his mind slipping down into unconsciousness.

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as always thanks for reading guys


	19. Chapter 19

Nathan opened his eyes slowly. The stars were glimmering above him, and thin streamers of light were winding through the sky. The air was brisk and cold, stinging his lungs as he drew breath. He tried to move but found that he couldn't quite manage it. His limbs felt much too heavy to move. He couldn't even lift his head to look around him.

Than a voice rang out. It was blurred, like Nathan's head was underwater, and he couldn't make out the words. Another voice answered the first. Nathan still couldn't understand but he could tell that this voice was much deeper than the other.

He thought back to the last thing he could remember. It was being thrown against a wall by Elsa. The memory was fuzzy and he couldn't recall the finer details, but he defiantly remembered being thrown. Why had she thrown him? He remembered a blast of power, was that what had thrown him? Why had Elsa been throwing so much energy around?

Something slid under his head and lifted it slightly. He heard garbled voices again and tried to move his eyes. It was hard, but he managed. He saw three blurry figures. One of them was much shorter than the others, standing at most a third of their height off the ground. He wondered why the figures were so blurry, and one of them got closer to him.

As it drew closer its face became clearer. It was a grey stone like thing, and Nathan felt like he had seen it before. It had a big nose, and that was more or less the extent of what he could tell about it. It spoke in a gravelly voice again but he still couldn't understand. It put out a hand and set it down on Nathan's forehead. He wondered briefly what it was doing before an electric shock racked his body.

He felt his mind return to him quickly as his body gave a large spasm. In an instant he was up on his feet in a flurry of motion. He just had time to straighten up completely before a skull-splitting pain attacked his brain. He groaned and fell to one knee and put a hand to his head.

The figures around him gathered around him and started gibbering, barely audible over a new ringing sound flooding his ears. He felt them putting hands on his back and trying to pull him back to his feet. It suddenly occurred to him that he didn't know who these people were, or if they were people at all. In spite of the pain he threw his arms out at the figures and stumbled away from them.

Something caught on his foot, and he tumbled back. Before he hit the ground something much softer than the dirt stopped him. He let whatever it was break his fall and tried to focus his eyes on the figures still coming at him. His eyes stubbornly refused to focus, and he gave up on that.

Than he realized the things that were beneath him were hands. He flailed again, trying to escape. At a word from one of the figures the hands closed, completely restraining him. No matter how hard he pulled he couldn't loosen the grips the hands had on him.

The figures were getting closer to him and his efforts to escape redoubled. He tried to focus his power, but the ringing and the pain provided a massive block. He found himself unable to work his mind around the block. Not only was he unable to focus his power, he found no power to focus. His reserves of magical energy were completely empty.

The figures came close to him now, and he tried to push himself away from them. He didn't make much progress, though, and one of the figures approached him. It extended a long limb towards him, and he writhed away from it. It hesitated a moment before taking hold of one of Nathan's pouches and pulling it off of his bandoleer. He tried to think what that pocket had contained, but was too panicked in the current situation to think clearly. It pulled the pouch towards it and started removing things from it, systematically throwing what took to the ground. After several of the items fell to the floor the thing seemed to find what it was looking for.

It took the thing and held it out to Nathan, pushing it against his head. He tried franticly to pull away from it, then felt something strange. The pain in his head died and the ringing quieted. He recognized the feel of the bone charm. He stopped his struggles and tried again to focus on the figure. This time he was able to make out a few things, the primary one was that the figure was mostly the same color of Elsa's dress.

He got a sinking feeling in his stomach as he started realizing what was happening. His head was still foggy, but the pieces were starting to fit together. The small figure was most likely the troll that they had taken him to when he had been incapacitated the first time, the one that just helped him was Elsa, and the one that hadn't really done anything yet was Anna. He would've felt his cheeks burning if he were not still freaking out about the hands holding him.

Elsa seemed to notice this, and spoke a word to what must have been more trolls under him. The hands all gave one big push and he was flung to his feet. He stumbled unsteadily forwards. He would've fallen again if Elsa hadn't caught him. She pulled him up so she could look directly into his face and he stared blankly back at her. She tried to say something to him but it was still impossible to understand.

Something occurred to Nathan, and he thought to himself that he might have a concussion.

He kept staring blankly into Elsa's face as she kept talking to him. After a few moments she stopped and looked at him expectantly. A few more seconds of silence passed and the small troll next to Anna said something. Elsa took Nathan's hand and led him over to it and pushed his back to get him to bend down. He did, and the troll put a handful of leaves up to Nathan's nose. Before he could pull away he inhaled and coughed at the strong smell of the leaf.

As he coughed he said "What the hell is that?"

Elsa and Anna laughed, and the troll gave Nathan a smile. "Welcome back." he said happily and addressed Anna and Elsa, saying "his senses are back, but his body must recover normally. He requires rest."

Elsa and Anna nodded, and Nathan said "What? I feel fine now." He took a few steps around and almost fell again. Anna moved quickly to catch him, propping him up on her shoulder. He pushed her away saying "I don't need any he-" his words were cut short by a compressed gurgling sound and he felt his diaphragm tighten. He doubled over and heard what little fluid was in his stomach splatter on the ground by way of him mouth.

He spat a few times and wiped his mouth, than stood back up. He turned back to Anna and found her looking at him like he was an idiot. "I" he said "am concussed, aren't I?"

The troll nodded and said "I have done what I can for you, but you require rest."

Nathan nodded. "Rest sounds pretty good right about now." He turned to Elsa and asked "How are we getting out of here?"

Elsa was also giving him a look that told him that he was missing something. She wordlessly pointed, and Nathan saw about twenty feet away a horse stamping on the ground. "Oh." He said flatly and put a hand to his head. "I think I really need some sleep." He said in an almost pleading tone. Anna put his arm over her shoulder and helped him over to the horse, and Elsa stayed back to thank the troll.

Nathan clamored up on to the horse, and Anna followed. Elsa came back and looked up at them. "Ready to go?" she asked and both Nathan and Anna nodded. She got up on the saddle and squeezed in front of Anna and took the reins. She dug her heels into the horse's sides and took off.

After a few minutes of silence Nathan spoke to Elsa "So you got everything under control while I was out?"

She looked down and seemed sad. "Yes." She answered "in a way, I did."

Nathan wanted to get a better answer, but supposed that it would have to wait until a more appropriate time. He turned his attention to Anna in front of him and asked quietly enough that Elsa wouldn't hear him "Is she all right?"

Anna turned and gave him a look that said "I'll tell you later" and turned back around. Nathan sighed and leaned back slightly in the saddle. It seemed everything would have to wait until they got back to Arendelle. It occurred to him that he didn't know where this little troll coven was, and he put his attention to his surroundings to try and learn where it was.

The ride took them through a fairly dense forest that Nathan was overall unfamiliar with. He looked blearily through the trees and could've sworn that he saw a few pairs of glowing eyes from between some trees. He tried to point them out to Anna but they were gone by the time she looked, and she gave him another one of those looks of concern. He insisted that they had been there, but even as he was talking he started to wonder himself.

He'd never had a concussion, so he didn't know what exactly they did. For all he knew, hallucinations like that were totally normal. He made a mental note to ask the doctors back at the castle about the effects of excessive head trauma.

He wondered if his powers were still blocked. After all, the pain was gone, and that was the thing that had been the major block for his powers. He experimentally reached for his power and found very little. He chose to test with his shadow orb, and he pushed his power into the spell. A small ball of shadow grew in his hand and he held it up to his face. It seemed unchanged from what it normally was, and Nathan nodded to himself, satisfied. He sucked the power back from the spell and the orb shrank quickly to nothing.

A feeling of building pressure started in his head, and he pushed the numbing bone charm against his head harder. It didn't relieve the sense of pressure. He went for the bag on his front that contained bone charms and found it. For a brief moment felt it in his hand, than his eyes widened and he started to sweat. He remembered Elsa throwing charms to the ground. He hadn't picked them up.

He must have given off some noise or something, because both Anna and Elsa looked back at him worriedly. Elsa saw the bag in his hands and gave him a smile. She pulled a sack that looked like it was made from woven strands of grass from the front of the saddle and handed it to Anna, who handed it to Nathan than turned back around.

He took it and hurriedly dug through it, counting each charm individually. After he finished that bag he moved to his pouch. When he had the number he compared it to his last count. Than he realized that he couldn't remember his last count. He gave a frustrated sigh and thought as hard as he could about what his last count had been. The thought only made the pressure in his head worse, so he stopped.

He tried to focus on something else instead. The landscape flying by provided something to look at without making him focus too much. He watched the trees and hills whiz by, and must have dozed off at some point, because he blinked and found the horse approaching the gates of the castle.

The gates were sliding open slowly and Elsa was talking to the guard stationed on the wall above. They were saying something about people being concerned about the gates being closed, but Nathan didn't catch the details. The two bid farewell and the horse walked through the now open gate.

As the horse entered the courtyard both Anna and Elsa got off before it stopped. Nathan continued to sit on the thing, waiting for it to stop so that he could get off more easily. The two women both went to one side of the horse and looked up at Nathan, who looked down at them and said "What?"

They looked at each other than Elsa said "Nathan, you can't get down on your own and you know it."

Anna gave Nathan a puppy dog face and said "Just let us help you!"

Nathan scowled down at them and said "You think I can't do this on my own?" in an offended voice. "I'll show you." He whispered to himself as he swung one leg over the horse. Or tried to, anyway. His foot caught in the stirrup, pulling the saddle to the side. The leather band that wrapped around the horse to keep the saddle in place came loose, and the whole thing slid to the side. Miraculously enough, Nathan was still on the saddle. His grip had tightened as soon as he felt the movement (about halfway down) and he had been able to clutch on hard enough to keep him there. He just sat for a moment, upside down, his hair brushing the ground. "Well" he said from under the horse in a flat voice "I've failed." He could hear Anna and Elsa giggling at him, so he said loudly in their direction "I could use some help over here!"

The giggling got a little muffled as they covered their mouths and bent over to help. They tried to push the saddle back upright, but with Nathan in it was too heavy. They tried to get Nathan to just drop from the saddle, but he said his foot was tangled in some straps. When they looked they found a mess of leather wrapped around Nathan's boot. It took several minutes for them to untangle him, but eventually they got his foot free. Elsa took his shoulders so that he wouldn't just fall and Anna took his legs so they wouldn't slam down on the ground.

The next thing they had to do was convince Nathan to let go. He insisted that a fall from the height he was at would seriously injure him. Elsa tried to demonstrate to him that he was hardly an inch off the ground, but he insisted he was higher. Eventually she just told him to relax all his muscles. He grudgingly complied and as soon as he did she pulled as hard as she could on his shoulders. His grip on the saddle broke and he slid along the ground slightly as she pulled. Anna guided his legs down carefully and set them down gently. Nathan hadn't reacted at all when he was pulled off, just letting himself be torn off the saddle.

Anna and Elsa took a step back from him and let him lay a moment on his back. He looked up at them and said "There, that wasn't so hard was it?" Anna snorted and Elsa put a hand to her forehead as Nathan tried to clamor to his feet. As he righted himself on one knee his vision swam and he could feel himself falling. He braced his body as hard as he could, than felt the light push of the ground on his chest. His vision cleared and he saw that he had fallen about a foot from kneeling to ground. He got up and tried again, this time with the help of both Anna and Elsa.

This worked out much better, and he found himself actually able to stand with their help. The world spun wildly though, and his steps were slow and uncoordinated. He knew that he wouldn't be walking anywhere on his own any time soon.

The two women helped him into the castle and through the halls. He had to stop a few times to keep himself from falling over or spewing again. He may have passed out again somewhere along the trip, because before he knew it he was looking at the door to his room. Anna was opening the door so that Elsa could usher him through the door. He walked as best he could with Elsa's support and made his way to the chair by the small table, more falling into the chair than sitting down.

He looked up to find both Elsa and Anna standing around him. They were asking concernedly saying "are you going to be alright? Do you need anything?"

Nathan looked around the room and thought of things he might need. He looked to the table and thought of one thing that he did want. "Water." He said in a shaky voice.

Elsa looked to Anna and said "I'll get it." than rushed off through the door.

Nathan looked up at Anna and said "So, what's up with her? What happened while I was out?"

Anna sighed and took a seat on the edge of Nathan's bed. She said "Well after you got blasted, she passed out. All I could think to do was to call for the doctors. They gave you some help, but said they couldn't do anything for Elsa. We were all worried about you're…" her voice trailed off and she waved a hand at Nathan's head.

He gave her a confused look and asked "My concussion?"

Anna gave him a puzzled look and said "What? No, we knew you'd be fine, we were worried about the…" she gasped suddenly and said "You haven't seen it, have you?"

Nathan shook his head and said "Seen what? I don't know what you're talking about."

Anna got up and went to a set of drawers. She threw one open and shuffled through it, then pulled out a small hand mirror. She brought it back over to Nathan and handed it to him wordlessly. He took it and looked into it.

His black hair was marked now with several streaks of white running through. He put a hand up to it and felt the changed hair. It felt the same as the other hair, but it was strange to see something he was so used to be so different suddenly. He noticed something else, and looked deeper into the mirror.

Anna noticed his change in focus and said "What is it? Is something else different?"

Nathan pulled his eyelid up and looked at his eyes. He knew what color his eyes had been, they had been a dark brown, but now they were a faded grey-blue color. He looked away from the mirror and handed it back to Anna. She looked from the mirror to Nathan's face several times before she seemed to notice what he had seen.

She gasped again and said "Are you alright? What does it feel like?"

Nathan shrugged "Feels pretty normal to me."

Elsa walked back into the room with a glass and a pitcher of water. She stopped in the door frame and looked between them, than down at the mirror. She gave Anna a look that was somewhere between anger, regret, and thankfulness. It was a weird look.

She walked carefully across the floor, picking each spot of her foot to fall carefully until she came close enough to set the pitcher and glass down on the table. She looked sadly at Nathan out of the corner of her eye and said "I'm sorry." quietly.

Nathan poured himself a glass (taking special caution to ensure the water got into the glass) and said "For what?" he shrugged "You didn't mean to, so I've nothing to be mad about."

Elsa gave him an appreciative look and said "Thanks."

She turned to Anna and said "It's about time for bed, don't you think?"

Anna looked at Elsa and said "Wha…" than seemed to realize something. "Oh! Yes, it's getting late."

Nathan looked between the two and said "What?" in a confused voice.

Elsa rolled her eyes and said "We have some business to do with the Corona-ins. Boring royal stuff, you know."

Nathan nodded and said "I'll be here. Asleep."

The two women nodded and id him good night, closing the door and blowing out the lantern behind them.


	20. Chapter 20

Nathan woke up falling. Or, more accurately, he woke up flailing. The covers of the bed were wrapped around him and keeping him from throwing himself from the bed. After a moment of trying to grab something to stop his nonexistent fall, he stopped and realized he was reacting to a dream. He forced himself to stop and look around.

He reaffirmed to himself that he was not plummeting through the air and sat up. He looked to his window and saw the sun absent from the night sky. He stood from his bed and got his gear on. He took the bone charms that were usually across his chest and pulled the bag from a pocket. He sorted through them, spilling them out on the table and examining them.

He picked them up one by one and placed them to his ear. After he knew what the one he was holding did, he made a mental note of it and put it off to the side. He was looking for a specific charm. One that would help him to recover. The majority of charms he didn't need to check, as he could tell by just the look of the charms which were more powerful. The one he was looking for was a powerful charm, a thing called a witches charm. It was a bone charm that was made up of shards of regular bone charms.

He typically avoided such charms as they tended to do more damage than good when used. Each one had a benefit, but also a drawback. The drawback was usually something to do with the benefit, like if the benefit was you were harder to see than the drawback would be that you were harder to loose.

He moved all the normal charms to one side of the table and all the witches charms to another. He started sorting through them, and after a few minutes he found the one he was looking for. The charm thrummed in his hand and made that otherworldly sound. It was called "supernatural recovery" and he hadn't used it much. It made wounds and injuries heal at a much accelerated rate, but at the cost of crippling his magical energy.

He took the charm and clipped it into his bandoleer. Immediately he felt the well of power he had gotten in his sleep change. It didn't lessen or dry up, but it was like the charm disrupted the magic's generation in Nathan's body. He knew that he wouldn't be able to cast nearly as many spells now. Maybe a single shadow form and a blink. If he was lucky.

He looked down at the rest of the witches charms. The magic crippling effect that he had now was a common drawback of those kinds of charms was common, and it wasn't like he could generate negative amounts of magic…

He looked through the rest of the pile like a kid in a candy shop. There were so many charms he had never used. It was difficult to decide which ones he wanted now that he could use them. Of course he had to limit himself from choosing anything dangerous, which actually narrowed the selection considerably. He took a few that had the same crippling effect and listened to what the benefits would be.

One he chose had the effect of letting him fall huge distances without injury, and another made him near impossible to detect if he wasn't moving. Another one let him gain massive amounts of energy when he killed something, and yet another let his own power block physical damage directly. So many choices. He decided to keep looking through the pile.

He chose a charm at random and inspected it. It was a charm that he recognized as being called "unnatural acrobatics". It would greatly increase things like depth perception and balance, again at the cost of magic regeneration. He decided that with his concussion this charm might even his movement out back to normal, and added it to his choices.

He looked over the rest of the pile. There weren't many witches charms left, and he almost wished that he had more. The effects they had were so fun sometimes, but in the end he preferred the stability of the regular bone charms. He took the charm that would make him being detected mostly motion based, called "statuesque" and turned his attention to the regular bone charms.

This pile was much bigger than the other, with probably around thirty or forty instead of the barely ten of the others. He knew these charms much better than the other ones and already knew which ones he wanted. The pain charm was a given at this point. He reached forwards and took it first, adding it to his bandoleer. The next one that he grabbed was one called "resilient". It had much the same effect as the "supernatural recovery" but it was much weaker, and had no drawback. He didn't actually know if the effect of the two would stack with one another, but it couldn't hurt.

He didn't really have any other charms that would help him recover, so he started raking the remaining bone charms back into the pouch. Something occurred to him, and he walked across the room to his set of drawers and slid the bottom one open. He removed the little pearl that the smoke man had yielded and examined it again. It didn't look any different, but Nathan could now think of one more way he could test what it was.

He picked a charm up off the table and examined it first. It was one that he had never found much use for, called "pricked touch". It made it so that if anything living touched him it would get a little needle-like wound where it had touched him. He had never really seen the use of it, so he didn't mind losing it should something happen to it.

He touched the charm and the pearl together carefully, holding them away from him. He waited a moment before bringing them apart again. He tapped them together a few more times experimentally but nothing happened. He sighed disappointedly and tossed both back onto the table.

He started walking to the door, ready to start the day, when he heard a hissing sound behind him. He turned cautiously and saw the pearl shaking on top of a bone charm. He walked back over to the table and looked at the pearl. The light inside it looked like it was draining out of the bottom into the charm. He quickly tried to identify the charm that it was affecting, but he found that he couldn't.

After a few seconds of the pearl draining its internal glow drained completely. It stopped shaking and rolled off the top of the bone charm. Nathan picked it up carefully and felt it. It was cold to the touch, and the light had gone dark. He turned his attention to the charm that it had interacted with. It looked the same, with its cracked and slightly burnt ends.

He picked it up and as soon as his fingers made contact with it he felt something. Something strange and different than what normal bone charms did. He hesitantly took the thing and put it up to his ear. The sound that it made was bizarrely different from the other charms, but also implacably similar. He tried to listen to what its effect would be, but it was too different to tell. It was like it had become another kind of bone charm altogether.

He shrugged and added it to his bandoleer. If he couldn't tell what it did, than he would find out some other way. He took the now dead pearl and put it back into the drawer he had taken it from. "No sense in throwing you away" he said to the .little pearl "I may learn something yet."

With that he strode to the door and left his room.

The hallways were dimly lit and felt empty to him. He wondered what time it was and decided to go and see if the cooks were up yet. With some degree of effort he recalled how to get to the dining hall and set off on his way.

He didn't pass a single person for the entire walk there. Seeing the castle so still and empty was strange, and he wondered if it was like this every morning. He came to the large doors of the dining hall and found them closed. He pushed them open with a considerable amount of effort and walked inside. It was dark, with sunlight just starting to stream through the windows. He took a moment to take in how much more he liked this lighting scheme than how it normally was. He looked around at the various tables and wondered if he could jump from table to table.

He walked over to one table and put one foot up onto the table. He was about to push himself up when the world started spinning. He tried to grab onto the table to keep his balance but failed, and went stumbling off to the side, luckily landing in a chair. His stomach instantly started to churn and his head pounded painfully.

He got up from his seat and walked slowly to the door, still holding his stomach. He put his shoulder up against the door and pushed as hard as he could without vomiting. The door creaked open slowly, and he wormed his way through the narrow opening between the door and wall.

He walked slowly through the hallways, not knowing where he was going. He propped himself on the wall with one arm while holding his stomach with the other. He walked unsteadily along the wall while looking for someone to help him.

After a few minutes of shambling along the wall he heard footsteps. He turned and saw a foot just disappear around a corner. He called out "Hey! Hel… help me!" and started making his way towards the corner that the foot had disappeared around.

He took slow shambling steps, dizzy again in spite of the charm. He lost his footing, and in a desperate attempt to reach the wall, threw himself at the wall. This move worked, and his shoulder smacked into the wall with a solid thud that made Nathan glad he had the numbing charm.

He pulled himself around the corner at the same time the person did. It was a maid, as it turned out. Her head poked curiously around the corner at the same time that he did. Their faces were mere inches from each other. The woman's eyes took a second to focus on Nathan, but when they did she let out a terrified scream.

She stumbled back from Nathan and fell to her back, still managing to scoot away from him. Nathan, for his part, was holding his head in his hands still trying to recover from the pain that the sudden spike of noise had brought. By the time that his head had cleared from the pain the maid was gone.

He put his hands back to the wall and continued walking. While he walked he thought about where he was going. The library would likely be empty, the dining hall he had already been to, and he didn't want to go outside. The thought suddenly occurred to him that he didn't even know why he was up and out of bed. He stopped walking and looked down at the ground with a bewildered expression.

There had to be a reason. Surely he wouldn't have just gotten up for no reason. He wasn't that bad, was he? He looked to the side and out a window. The sun still hadn't come over the horizon yet, and the moon was just starting to dip. He saw his reflection in the glass of the window and examined himself.

His eyes were still a grey-blue color, and his hair still had a few white streaks running up and down the strands of black hair. He ran a hand through his hair and stared at his reflection, wondering why the maid had run away from him. He wasn't that ugly, was he? He looked down at his chest at the new charm he had gotten and wondered if that had something to do with the woman running away.

He looked back at his refection and felt something nagging at his mind. His reflection reminded him of someone. He tried to place who it was. It was a girl, it was someone he had met recently, it was someone important…

He cursed himself quietly and said "Come on, think!"

He suddenly associated his new partial hair color with someone and recalled her name. "Elsa!" he said loudly "That's the one!"

He turned away from the window and looked to the halls of the castle. "Now how do I get to her…" his voice trailed off and his shoulders dropped.

His stomach seemed to have calmed and his balance was starting to return to him, so he walked semi-normally through the halls, stumbling only occasionally and not falling over even once. He found himself at the base of the spiral stairs that he on some level knew would take him to Elsa's bedroom.

He struggled to place his feet on the stairs and keep his balance as he pushed himself up the winding staircase. His balance gave out about halfway up the first flight, and he dropped himself to his knees and kept climbing. By about the second floor he felt the urge to vomit return. He stopped and breathed deeply, trying to settle whatever in his body had been upset by the stairs.

As he sat there breathing, he thought about his various charms strapped to his chest and wondered how he would feel if he didn't have them. He thought about removing one to see how severe his concussion really was but decided that that would be an incredibly bad move. If the effects of the charms returned him to a barely functioning level than he didn't want to know how the crippling effects of his concussion would feel without the buffer of magic.

Then that was another thing, the magic. Elsa had hit him with a last of her magic, and beyond the head injury he hadn't felt any effects of the power. His body had changed though, minor changes, but changes nonetheless. He felt like he should feel something related to the power she had hit him with. He had seen the raw amount of power that she had let off, and he knew that he was probably lucky to still be alive. With his mind in the condition it was in and his own power blocked for the most part to help the healing, he was rather unwilling to experiment on himself to find what the effects were.

His nausea and dizziness past slowly and he continued pulling himself up the stairs. The going was slow and unpleasant, but he had to speak to Elsa. He continued crawling, walking, and pulling himself up the stairs and eventually came to the third floor. He almost cried with happiness when he reached the top of the stairs and lay flat on his back the floor.

As he lay looking up at the ceiling a faint ray of sun fell through the windows and straight into his eyes. He raised a hand to shield his face from the bright light and groaned. The light made his head hurt and his eyes ache. He rolled over to shield his eyes from the light and pushed himself back to his feet.

He continued pushing his way forward and bracing himself against the wall and window shielding his eyes all the while. He focused his mind on the things in front of him, the wooden floor, the paper on the walls, and especially the two side-by-side doors that he knew led to Anna and Elsa's bedrooms. Anything to distract him from the pain of his eyes burning. The issue of which room belonged to which person was one that he would deal with when he came to that hurtle, not before.

He staggered over to the other side of the hall and found himself regretting getting up this morning. He looked unsurely at the two doors, trying to remember which room was Elsa's. He stepped back from the two doors and examined both of them and weighed the two against each other.

One had blue diamond patters on it, the other had brownish-red patterns. Both were of identical size and shape. One was to his right, one was to his left. He shook his head to clear his mind and looked back at the doors. He felt like the answer was painfully obvious, but he just couldn't see it.

See it…

He put his eye to the keyhole on the door with the red-brown pattern and saw a wild mane of bushy red hair sticking up from under the covers of the bed. Defiantly not Elsa.

He stepped back from that door and turned to the other one. He raised his fist to knock on the door.

.

.

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sorry this one took me so long, just had to get my brain juices(?) flowing again. the next one will be soon i promise.

as always leave a comment and whatever.


	21. Chapter 21

Elsa was having a wonderful dream. It was something about bright fields and the warm sun. She was a small child, just as she had been about sixteen years ago. Anna was there too, laughing and playing with her. They were running around in the field together playing various games and having a good time.

Her parents were sitting not too far off, shouting encouragements at her and Anna in-between loving words with his wife. He and his wife were wearing casual wear today instead of the formal military-wear he usually had when dealing with ruling the kingdom. Today he wasn't the king of Arendelle, today he was a father.

After some time he joined in their game of hide and seek. Elsa and Anna decided quickly that he should be the one to seek them. He agreed and turned away from them and started counting down from ten. Elsa and Anna scurried off into the tall grass and threw themselves to the ground becoming almost completely invisible. As their father reached zero, he turned back to the direction that they had been in and uncovered his eyes.

Anna and Elsa gave a few suppressed giggles as he said "Now where could they have gone?" to himself as he brushed a few blades of grass aside so he could see a bit of the covered area. He saw the small foot of a child disappear into more of the tall grass and smiled, chasing after it.

Elsa gave a screech of delight as she looked back and saw her father chasing after her. She went tearing off through the grass as fast as she could. She ran as quickly as her little legs would carry her, but no matter how quickly she ran her father only gained ground.

She looked briefly to the front of her just in time to see Anna looking surprised at her. She rammed into Anna at full speed, sending both girls sprawling on the ground. Their father walked up and, laughing, picked up both Anna and Elsa by one leg and held them up above his head, shouting to his wife "Honey, look what I caught!"

The woman laughed and said "Put them down dear, you'll hurt them."

He looked to the two upside-down children in his hands and said "No, I don't think these little creatures are as frail as they look." squinting at them. He pretended to examine them for a moment than called out "But they might be good to eat!"

His wife laughed and the girls screamed playfully. They struggled half-heartedly to free themselves from his grip, but failed. He carried them over to the blanket that his wife was sitting on and set them down gently, wrapping them tightly in the blanket so they couldn't move. He sat down and pulled a basket full of food from somewhere the girls could not see and said "see? We've got just enough to serve them both up."

The girls struggled against the blanket that bound them, but to no avail. The king said "Of course, we'll have to stuff them first." The queen gave him an exasperated smile and opened the basket. Elsa could smell the sweet scent of the food, she could almost taste it…

.

Than a dull knocking woke her up. She sat up in her bed and looked around her. The various crystalline ice formations around her room reflecting thin rays of sun, shooting them all over the room. She rubbed her eyes and looked out her window. The sun was barely out yet, shining weak rays of light all over the room. Her first thought was wondering why someone was waking her up this early, and her second was that they had better have a really good reason too.

She pulled herself out of her bed and walked over to her wardrobe, dragging her feet all the way. She threw the doors to her closet open and took a few articles of clothing down, putting them on hurriedly. After a moment of examining herself in a mirror to make sure she was presentable she stepped over to the door and braced herself mentally for whatever royal business lay beyond the door. She opened the door and said "Yes?" expectantly.

Then she looked at what was in front of her. It was certainly not the messenger or guard that she thought it would be. Her eyes took a moment to focus on whatever it was, but when they did she gasped and stumbled back.

The thing in front of her was totally alien. It was like a mass of turning and twisting shadows had come together to form one body, barely held together by writhing and twisting bands of darkness that flitted across the surface of its body and then was wiped away the next moment. The thing was in a humanoid shape, with its arms and legs hanging loosely on the rest of its body and shoulders slumped. It was about her height and of a slightly stronger build than her. It seemed to emanate a feeling of dread, making her mind jump to horrifying conclusions as to why the thing was in front of her.

Elsa let out a horrified scream and threw an arm up defensively, prompting a spike of ice to shoot out of the ground and spike towards the thing. It dodged slowly away from the spike and said something in a bizarre voice that echoed around the room, stepping forwards towards Elsa and putting a hand out as if it was concerned.

Elsa fell to the floor and shot another spike at the thing, this time the spike looked like it grazed the things head. It reeled back from the spike and toppled over to the floor. A beam of light fell directly on its chest, and Elsa could see a patch of fabric become visible through the writhing shadows. She got quickly back to her feet and got into a more combative stance, using her magic to turn the beams of reflected light to the things face.

The twisting blackness receded to reveal Nathan's face, which said "What the hell are you doing?" loudly. She dropped her arms and rushed over to him to help him up. As soon as his face left the beam of light the shadows returned, completely hiding his identity.

Elsa got him back to his feet and said "Nathan, what is all this?" and gestured to the shadows covering him. He looked down at himself and said something that was completely incomprehensible. Elsa looked at him a second before saying "I can't understand a word your saying."

The dark figure of Nathan fumbled around with something on its chest for a minute before the shadows flew off of him and into something in his hand. Elsa looked down and saw a bone charm. Nathan was looking at it with a puzzled expression, saying "That's interesting…" before his voice trailed off.

Elsa gave him a puzzled look and gestured at the charm. He smiled and said "I was wearing it to see what it did. What did it do, by the way? Other than make you a psychopath."

Elsa sighed and dissolved the ice she had summoned into the air. She walked over to her bed and took a seat, saying "I don't know, make you a big… shadow… thing." She looked again at the window and said "Nathan, why are you up this early? You should be in bed resting. I should be in bed resting. We should both still be asleep!"

Nathan smirked and said "Yet here we are." He looked down at the charm in his hand and held it out to Elsa. "Here, use this." Elsa was about to ask him why but he preempted her by saying "I just want to see what it looks like."

Reluctantly Elsa took the charm and pushed it against her chest. She didn't feel any different, but Nathan jumped back and exclaimed "Whoa!" She looked down at herself but didn't see anything different. She stood from the bed and took a step towards Nathan, saying "Well how do I look?" in a playful kind of voice.

Nathan only tilted his head in response. It seemed that he couldn't understand her. She couldn't help but wonder where he had gotten the charm. She walked past him and stepped in front of a mirror. Her reflection was normal, there wasn't a single out of place shadow at all. Nathan stepped behind her and looked at her reflection as well. A thoroughly confused look came over his face and he said "Well that's very interesting."

Elsa assumed that her reflection was as clear for him as it was for her, and held the charm out to him. She didn't see the shadow come off of her like it had for Nathan, but by the way his eyes followed something to the charm she could also safely assume that he saw it.

He took the charm and pocketed it, nodding his appreciation to Elsa. Elsa yawned widely and said "So is that it, or…"

Nathan's eyes widened and he said "Oh!" than put a fist to his forehead and said to himself "What was it, what was it, what was it?" he turned and paced around the room a few times with his eyes closed. Elsa grew slightly concerned about him. She said "Nathan? Are you alright?" He nodded silently but the motion didn't do much to reassure Elsa. He had a concussion, and a very serious one at that. Her medical staff had told her that he might think he was fine, but he needed rest.

She stepped forwards and put a hand on Nathan's back and said "You need rest. You should go back to your room and sleep. Nathan stopped his pacing and wriggled away from Elsa's hand.

He opened his eyes back up and looked at her, saying "What? No, I'm fine." His focus returned to the mirror and he stared into it briefly. He took a few steps towards it and stared intently at his own face. Elsa was about to ask him what he was doing when he suddenly turned and snapped his fingers. "I remember!" Elsa jumped slightly, startled by his sudden movement. He looked at Elsa and pointed at his eye and hair. "What is this?"

Elsa gave him a confused look and said "It's your eye… and your hair. You've had them for some time now."

Nathan shook his head and said "No, no, the change, the pale, the white!" he stopped and took a deep breath before trying again. "The magic that caused the change, what is it? Has it happened before? It has to have some effect beyond hair dye, so what is it?"

Elsa sighed and looked down. She said "Yes, it's happened before. It's that when you got blasted, some ice formed in your body. Pabbie said that because you have power, you are more resistant though, so it won't freeze any more of you." Nathan gave her a puzzled look when she said Pabbie and she cleared it up "The troll."

Nathan nodded, than raised an eyebrow and said "When did this happen before?"

Elsa's eyes fell and she heaved an even heavier sigh. "I almost killed Anna once." Nathans eyes widened and he seemed to focus more on her. She continued "I froze her heart with my power, and she would've frozen solid if she hadn't saved me."

Nathan looked slightly worried, and asked "Am I in danger of dying like that? How would I stop it?" He started fidgeting, pulling at the strands of white hair and picking at his pale grey eyes. Elsa hated to see him acting like this. She was the reason he was doing that.

She said "Well, Anna was able to unfreeze her heart by saving me, because it was an act of true love."

Nathan's shoulders dropped and he said grimly "Well than I hope your troll friend was right, because if he wasn't… I'm royally fucked."

Elsa was a bit taken aback by his profanity, but was more disturbed by the comment as a whole. "Surely you have something you love!" she said hopefully. She wanted desperately for there to be some way that he could save himself from her magic if it started to be a problem. If he died because of her…

Nathan put a hand to his chin and started making a low humming sound as he thought. After a moment of this he stopped and said "No… no I can't really think of anything."

Elsa's face fell again, and she turned away from him. That couldn't be true. Everyone had to love something, right? Maybe he was right, maybe he didn't love. Was it because of his past; His bloody, sad, unfeeling past? He had to love. If he didn't love anything now, than he would start soon. She was sure he had at least the ability to love.

Nathan spoke up, saying "What is it with you people and love, anyways?" Elsa turned and looked at him. he continued "Love isn't some mystical, all-powerful force." He put a thumb to his chest "I have a mystical power." he pointed to Elsa "You have a mystical power." He swiped his hand through the air and said "And neither of us can claim to use love as power."

Elsa wanted to say that that wasn't true, that she had used love plenty of times, but for each example she thought of she realized that love hadn't provided any power, just shown the way to use it. Nathan continued "Now I won't deny that love has sway over people, I've seen enough to know that. But love only affects you as much as you let it." Elsa heard him take a deep breath and she looked back up at him. "Though I… suppose that could be why I don't really love anything."

Elsa looked him over now, paying much more attention to how he actually looked. He looked tired, like he hadn't gotten much sleep. His eyes were sunken and looked unfocused. His shoulders drooped and his back was hunched more than usual. His face was a stony blank expression. Elsa felt responsible for all of it. She knew what she would do if it were Anna like this.

She spread her arms and walked towards Nathan, who eyed her suspiciously. "What are you doing?" he said cautiously. Elsa didn't respond as she kept approaching him. As she got close enough to actually close her arms around him he started backing up. "Elsa I don't want a hug." he said with a growing tone of concern. She still pursued him, and after a few seconds of him backing up he backed into the wall.

Elsa took advantage of this, circling her arms around him and latching her hands together on the other side of him. He struggled against her grip for a moment, then stopped. "Just this once." He said in a grudging voice.

Elsa smiled. She knew it would work. She felt the tension in Nathan's body fall away slightly. Not as much as she had hoped, but the change made her feel good.

Nathan, for his part, was surprised at how the hug felt. He hadn't been hugged much in his life, and when he imagined a hug all that came to mind was the pressure of the other person's arms around him. This hug, however, seemed to have much more than just that. He felt a warmth coming from Elsa, worming its way through his body spreading an unfamiliar feeling. His limbs felt heavier and his eyelids started to droop.

He pushed Elsa off of him gently and blinked rapidly in an attempt to stay awake. A high pitched ringing started in his ears and he put a hand to his head. Elsa looked concernedly at him and started talking to him, but her voice was unintelligible and muted against the ringing. Pain started to follow the ring, building in his head. He dropped to one knee and gasped. He tried to make sure that his bone charms were still on properly, but his vision blurred making it impossible to see.

He felt Elsa trying to pull him up to his feet but he didn't respond. He couldn't. He felt his mind slipping into unconsciousness again and tried to stay awake. He tried focusing on anything he could that would keep him anchored to awareness. What he focused on the most were Elsa's attempts to get him to his feet. They were erratic, and didn't feel very good on his arms.

The pain started to fade slowly, and his vision cleared slightly. He could still hear Elsa's muted voice talking to him, though he still couldn't tell what she was saying. She sounded worried which didn't surprise him. If it were Elsa on the floor clutching her head than he would probably be concerned too.

He pushed his way to his feet and made a grab at the nearest thing that wasn't Elsa he could see. This turned out to be a post on Elsa's bed. He successfully caught the thing in his hands and pulled himself up on it. He stood there gasping, trying to not to vomit. Elsa was in front of him now, still talking to him even though he couldn't understand her.

He held up a hand to signal she should stop talking. She did, and he tried again to clear his mind of the pain. It faded slowly, as did the ringing, and he shook his head again to be sure that it was gone. When he was sure he turned back to Elsa and said "Ok… ok I'm good now."

Elsa asked in a gentle voice "Are you sure? You looked pretty bad."

Nathan nodded and sat down on the side of Elsa's bad. He looked at the floor for a moment than started laughing. Elsa knelt down next to him and said "What? What's the matter?"

Nathan put a thumb between his chest and the bandoleer that held his bone charms and pushed it out slightly. "Boy am I glad I've got these!" he said in an uncharacteristically mirthful tone. Elsa was caught off guard by the sudden change in demeanor and wasn't sure how to respond. Nathan just continued laughing and laughing on the side of the bed.

She stood and cleared her throat, saying "Umm… Nathan… maybe you should just go back to your room and get some more sleep." Nathan looked up at her, still giggling to himself. Than as soon as it had started, the laughter stopped. The smile on his face was replaced instantly by a pained grimace and he clutched his head again. "Ow" he murmured "perhaps your right."

He stood shakily from the bed and started trying to walk to the door. Elsa stood and quickly put herself under Nathan's shoulder, helping him walk. She heard him open his mouth probably about to voice an objection, but none came.

The pair got about halfway to the stairs before a voice rang out behind them. "Elsa, Nathan, what are you doing?"

Elsa turned under Nathan's arm to see Olaf running towards them. He was waving his stick arms at them and smiling broadly as usual. As her drew up to them and slid to a stop. He looked up into Elsa's face and gave her the innocent look that reminded Elsa of a child. She looked from Nathan and Olaf and said "Olaf, can you take Nathan to his room for me, please?"

He nodded and walked over to the side of Nathan. Nathan took his arm off of Elsa and put his hand of the top of Olaf's head. Nathan gave Elsa a sarcastic look, sticking his tongue out in a playful manner. She gave him a concerned look and waved meekly as he and Olaf went off down the stairs. She could hear Olaf talking to Nathan, and Nathan grunting in response.

She turned her back on the two and went back to her room. She shut the door behind her and sighed. The visit from Nathan had been strange, certainly, but she was glad that it had happened. She felt like Nathan had been more open with her than he had ever been.

And all it had taken was serious head trauma.

She cringed at that though, guilt returning to her mind. She settled herself under the covers of her bed and set her head on the pillow. The last thing that did before falling asleep was say to herself "Get well soon Nathan."

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Authors thing:hmm... I'm not sure i like this open hearted Nathan. I hope he gets over it soon.

so anyways, here the chapter is. hope you like it!

remember to leave a comment, follow, do whatever, y'know.


	22. Chapter 22

Every time Olaf spoke Nathan felt a spinning wheel of spikes and blades grinding against his ears. The snowman's voice was just so high pitched that Nathan could hardly stand hearing it. He wasn't even listening to what the little thing was saying, he was just trying to cope with the pain brought on by his voice. It was nowhere near the pain that Nathan had felt in Elsa's room, but with every squeak and crack in Olaf's speech got his head started ringing just a little bit more.

When at last he reached his room he walked in and pulled the door behind him, not waiting for Olaf to talk anymore. The door latched and he could hear the snowman say a few more words before he seemed to notice that his audience had disappeared. Nathan heard him bid farewell to the door before walking off.

Nathan turned back to the empty room and looked it over. It was the same as he remembered leaving it. He looked to the table and saw the large bag of bone charms. Quickly he moved across the room and snatched the bag up, berating himself for leaving it out like that. He threw a drawer on his dresser open and tossed the bag inside, making a mental note to ask Elsa for a footlocker or something to keep them more secure.

Nathan looked at his bed with an expression of longing. He was tired now, and he slightly regretted getting up so early. He climbed onto the bed and removed his gloves and boots than settled into the bed on top of the covers. His head nuzzled into the pillow, and his eyes closed slowly.

When he next opened his eyes the sun was well above the horizon and someone was calling to him through his door. "Nathan? Nathan are you awake?" The voice didn't sound familiar to him. It sounded similar to Anna's voice, but higher in pitch. He sat up on the bed and moved his feet off the side.

"I am now." He said flatly to the door. The voice on the other side was quiet for a moment and then said "Well… sorry to wake you, but I wanted to see if I could help with your injury." Nathan raised an eyebrow and got up slowly from the bed. He walked to the door carefully to avoid falling and opened it slowly.

As the door swung open he found himself facing Rapunzel. She was shorter than him, and had to look slightly up at him to talk. She was wearing semi-thick colorful winter clothes that stood out in a stark contrast to everything else in the hallway. The dominate colors of her outfit seemed to be a bright yellow with sun patterns woven into the cloth.

She brushed her messy brown hair out of her face and waved at him, saying "Hi." He gave her a tired look and she laughed awkwardly. "So… how are you feeling?"

Nathan sighed and said "Better, I guess. Haven't puked or fallen yet, so that's good."

The two shuffled uncomfortably for a moment before Nathan broke the silence by asking "So how do you plan to help me, Mrs. Blondie?"

Rapunzel groaned and said "Really? You too?" she gave an annoyed sigh than looked at Nathan suspiciously. "Did Eugene tell you to call me that?" she stood on her toes and got closer to Nathan so that their faces were inches from each other. She starred intensely into Nathans eyes and said in a threatening whisper "And don't lie. I'll know."

Nathan didn't react to her getting closer at all. He simply returned her stare with a flat look of his own that seemed to say "Really?" she backed down from him slightly and he said in an equally flat voice "No." Nathan shrugged and said "Why would he anyways? Have a lot been calling you that recently?"

She nodded and her feet went back to being flat on the floor. "Everyone's been calling me that! I don't mind the name, but it's really weird that so many people are doing it. I think Eugene told people to call me that."

Nathan shrugged again and said "I did it sarcastically to say I still don't really believe you about the hair thing." Rapunzel sighed exasperatedly and Nathan smirked. "So how do you plan on helping with my brain damage?" he asked, changing the subject.

Rapunzel looked slightly taken aback, and said "You don t have brain damage!"

Nathan waved a hand dismissively and said "Serious cranial trauma. Whatever. Same thing." He thought of all the medical knowhow he possessed and decided to use it. "A concussion is a jarring of the brain inside of the cranium. The jarring counts as damage because it interrupts the normal workings of the brain. Brain damage."

Rapunzel looked at him with a puzzled expression for a second before she shook her head and said dismissively "Ok, fine, whatever. Fine, you have brain damage."

Nathan smiled to himself and said "Although maybe I'm getting better. The fact that I can remember that…" he was cut off when a sudden pain slashed through his skull like a razor. He grunted and put a hand to his temple and closed his eyes. "Or maybe not." he said through clenched teeth.

Rapunzel put a hand out and asked if he was ok, to which he replied "Yes, fine… fine." He opened his eyes again and blinked rapidly. All the light in the hall was blurred and burning its images into his eyes. He quickly shut his eyes and shielded them with a hand.

Rapunzel asked in a concerned voice "What's wrong?" and he replied "It's really bright out here."

Rapunzel looked around her. The hall wasn't very bright at all, with only a few light sources along the entire length. She grabbed Nathan's hand and said "Come on, let's take you to the doctors. They'll know what to do!" and started pulling on him.

He stood his ground and resisted Rapunzel's pulling. "Hold it, I'm not going anywhere just yet." He said. He continued rubbing his temple and slowly opened his eyes and felt them trying to readjust so he could see again. He let that go for about ten seconds before he looked back up and nodded to Rapunzel. "Alright, let's go." He said and motioned down the hallway.

The two started walking, and Nathan said "So you never answered me, how do you plan to help with the damage?" he asked, and added "You going to use your magic hair to fix me?" sarcastically.

She smirked and said "Something like that, yea." Refusing to say any more.

The pair passed a man in the outfit of a servant and Rapunzel stopped him. "Can you find Queen Elsa and Princess Anna and tell them that we're about to try the thing we discussed?" the man nodded and bowed before hurrying off. Nathan eyed both the man and Rapunzel before saying "So I'm the only one that has no clue what's going on." flatly.

Rapunzel smiled at Nathan and said in a chipper voice "Pretty much." Nathan hissed through his teeth in annoyance and Rapunzel laughed. "Oh, come on! This is going to cure you completely!"

Nathan raised an eyebrow and said "You really expect me to believe that? Fine. I'll see what it is you've got planned, but if I don't like it than I'm not doing it."

She snorted and exclaimed "But it save Eugene's life once! I'm sure that it works just as well on a concussion as it does stab wounds." "Besides," she said "why are you so hesitant all the sudden? I would've thought you'd want to get over this as soon as possible."

He pointed to his eye and said "Because this is not my natural eye color" he pointed to the white stripes in his hair "and this isn't my natural hair color." He put his hand down and finished with "I don't know if you've caught on, but magic doesn't seem to work on me as well as others. Gothel's gas, Elsa's ice, none of it did what the person casting it thought it would, so who knows what your magic would do."

Rapunzel looked down at the floor. "I'm just trying to help." She said sadly. Nathan replied "Yes, I get that, but so far magic that isn't mine has been unpredictable at best."

Rapunzel nodded and said "Well, my power has never done anything but heal people, so I think you're pretty safe."

Nathan gave a small shrug and said "Well than I look forward to it working."

The rest of the walk to the "Medical Wing" (A medium sized room dedicated entirely to the storage and usage of medical equipment) passed in silence. When they reached the room they found Eugene, Elsa, and Anna standing in the hall outside of the room.

Nathan looked warily at the group and said "So… everyone come to see the show?"

Eugene and Anna smiled, Elsa looked slightly worried. Rapunzel walked past them and opened the door. She turned back to all four and beckoned for them to come it. They did, and found the room mostly empty except for a small bowl of water on a table and two chairs around the table.

Rapunzel motioned for Nathan to sit in one of the chairs, so he did. She took a seat in the other and looked around at the rest of the people in the room. "Are you ready?"

Nathan sighed and said "Yea, I guess."

Rapunzel looked around at the faces in the room one last time, than took a deep breath and put both of her hands on the surface of the water. She opened her mouth and started singing.

"Flower, gleam and glow

Let your power shine

Make the clock reverse

Bring back what once was mine"

The light that was filling the rest of the room seemed to dim, and her pupils seemed to take on a strange glow that was hard for Nathan to place. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end and he started getting goose bumps. Something was going to go wrong, he could tell.

"Heal what has been hurt

Change the Fates' design

Save what has been lost

Bring back what once was mine"

Small tendrils of light, like the roots of a plant, started to spread through the water from Rapunzel's hands. Nathan shuffled around uncomfortably in his seat and gave an unsure look at Elsa. She nodded and smiled at him, so he returned his focus to the bowel.

"What once was mine"

She finished, and the tendrils of light spread through the water and made all of it glow brightly. Rapunzel looked up at Nathan and said "Go on, drink it."

Nathan took the bowl in his hands and lifted it up off of the table. He held it in front of his face and looked deep into the water. The bright golden glow of magic made Nathan nervous. There was a lot of power here, and he didn't know what the effect would be. Rapunzel had said that it would heal them, but…

Rapunzel said again "Drink it."

Nathan lifted it closer to his face and felt a warmth fall over his face like he had stepped out into the sun. His hands started to shake as he opened his mouth and brought the bowl closer. He shut his eyes tight and braced his body for whatever would come.

He brought the bowl to his lips and tipped it back, taking a big gulp of the water. As soon as the water started sliding down his throat he started taking the bowl away. Everyone was looking at him with anticipation on their faces. He gave a meek smile to show that he was ok, than started putting the bowl down.

His body gave a spasm and the bowl clattered to the floor. The water that he had drank was starting to feel like it was burning him. He put a hand on his stomach and felt his body starting to disagree with the magic.

He cried out as the burning sensation intensified into pain. He felt like he had swallowed molten glass. The faces around him grew distorted by tears that were forming in his eyes. He fell to the floor and curled up in a ball. He could hear the others in in the room asking if he was ok, but he couldn't muster an answer.

He had an idea somewhere in his pain-addled mind, and decided to use some of his now scarce magic energy. He focused his power and turned himself into a shadow. This didn't do much to relieve the pain, but it did clear his mind. The water that he hadn't quite gotten down splashed on the floor and lay there, still glowing. His shadow form rose a few inches out of his chair than shot out in a random direction. He didn't care where he went as long as it was away from that water.

His physical body reformed in a corner of the room, laying down with his back propped up on the wall behind him. His stomach felt like it was coated in lead, and his limbs were not even there. The group looked around the room and he tried to call out to them, but couldn't. After a few seconds of them looking, Eugene was the first to spot him. He called to the others and ran over to Nathan.

Nathan looked up at him and tried to speak, but something blocked his words. He tried to take a deep breath but found that blocked as well.

His eyes grew in panic as he looked at Eugene. Eugene looked him up and down than seemed to realize what was happening. He tilted Nathan's torso over so that he was facing the floor than pushed his hand against Nathan's stomach.

Of all the things that Nathan had seen himself do through the years, he was sure he had never vomited sunshine. The bright light combined with water spilled out of his mouth and he felt his diaphragm tighten to get more out.

After a few moments of vomiting he felt much better. The burning was gone and he didn't feel his body rejecting anything now. He tried to stand unsteadily but was pushed back down by Eugene. "No, you need to stay still a minute." he said to Nathan.

Nathan grabbed Eugene's shoulder and pulled himself up using that. "No" he said defiantly "I'm good, just help me up."

The rest of the group had circled around him by now, looking worriedly down at him. Rapunzel was the closest one other than Eugene. She was looking at Nathan with her hands over her mouth saying "I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry!" in a panicked manor. Elsa and Anna were behind Eugene and Rapunzel looking over their shoulders, giving Nathan some room. All of them were talking at once resulting in a loud droning of voices Nathan couldn't make out.

Nathan put a hand to his head and pulled himself full to his feet. He then pushed off of Eugene and put his back against the wall. He put up his other hand to quiet the room than said "I'm good! Just…" he waved his hand in front of him "…back off a little."

They did, and he covered his eyes with his hands. After standing still for a moment like that he uncovered them and pointed to the bowl on the floor. "We are not doing that again." he said flatly.

Rapunzel stepped forward and looked down guiltily. "I'm sorry Nathan." she said "We tried it last night on Elsa, and it seemed to work fine. I don't know what could've gone wrong…" she looked back at the bowl with a sad look on her face, than looked back at Nathan with a small glimmer of hope. "I guess it didn't help much, did it?"

Nathan shook his head to clear it and held his hands up in front of his eyes. The mild dizziness he had been feeling constantly since his injury was still there, as well as the "mental fog" as a few doctors had described it. While those were defiantly still there, something did seem to have improved. He couldn't quite place what it was, but he just felt clearer.

He nodded at Rapunzel and said "I think it did, a little bit. I feel better somehow." He looked around "Like everything is… clearer, sharper." he looked at their faces to see if they understood. "You know?"

They all nodded understanding. Rapunzel started squinting at him, and he asked. "What, have I got something on my face?" he wiped his face off, trying to get any vomit that was left over. Rapunzel shook her head.

"No." she said, grabbing his arm and lowering it. "Elsa, look at this." She said over her shoulder to Elsa. Eugene stepped out of the way and Elsa replaced him. Rapunzel pointed to Nathan's eye and Elsa started squinting at his face too.

She said "What is that?" under her breath just loud enough for Nathan to hear. He was starting to grow agitated again. He said "What? What's what? What's happening to me?" panic starting to grow in his voice. Elsa turned and motioned to Anna to get something that Nathan couldn't see. She raced off to retrieve it while Rapunzel started talking to Elsa.

"Should we take him to the trolls?" Rapunzel asked.

Elsa hesitated for a moment, then said "I'd rather be safe than sorry. Yes, we should. He might be immune to my magic but that doesn't mean he is to yours."

Rapunzel nodded. Nathan spoke up again, saying "What's wrong with me?"

Elsa turned away from him and said loudly "Anna, hurry up with the mirror!" A few seconds later Anna came running around the corner brandishing a small hand mirror. She slid to a stop in front of Elsa and handed it to her saying "Here." In a flustered voice.

Elsa handed the mirror to Nathan and said "Your eyes."

He took the mirror and looked into it. His eyes were still mostly blue from Elsa's magic, but a small golden ring had formed around his pupils. The rings looked much like the magic that Rapunzel had put in the water, with small tendrils that now looked like veins winding through the pale blue that covered the rest of his eyes. He pulled his bottom eyelid down and examined the rest of his eye while saying "Huh." out loud to himself.

Rapunzel looked up and said "What? Is something else wrong?"

Nathan shook his head and said "No, I'm just wondering why all the magic that I've been shot up with recently has been showing up in my eyes."

All the other people quieted slightly now, thinking about why that could be. After a few moments of silence Elsa spoke up and said "Maybe the trolls will know." she looked around at everyone else "Maybe we should just go now."

Everyone looked to Nathan as if for confirmation. He shrugged and said "Sure, let's go. My first time going awake."

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Aouthours thing:

this chapter feels weird to me, and i cant place why.

as always leave any comments or criticisms, i read them.

Oh yea, almost forgot, would anyone be down for a S.T.A.L.K.E.R./Avatar (the cartoon one) fic? because I've been having some ideas.


	23. Chapter 23

The horse ride to the valley was longer than Nathan had imagined it. The pounding of the horse's hooves on the ground made Nathan's head ring and his stomach queasy. The whole group had decided to come, bringing three horses for all five people. Nathan was riding the same horse as Anna, Eugene and Rapunzel were riding behind them, and Elsa was on her own horse in the front leading the group.

Nathan watched the flat snowy fields and snow-covered trees rush by as a stinging cold wind slashed at his face, making his eyes water. He tried to pay attention to the route that they were taking. The trolls seemed to have some knowledge of the outsider, and Nathan assumed that by extension they would know about bone charms. He pulled the strange new charm that shrouded the user in shadow out of a pocket to ensure he still had it, and wondered if they would be able to tell him anything about it.

The snowy forest and field that they were dashing through gradually sloped down, and turned from trees and patches of grass to rocks and stone. The temperature started to rise slowly and the air gained a sulphurous tinge to it. A few geysers of some gas passed them by, and Nathan could feel the heat radiating off of them.

The group came to the clearing that Nathan recognized as the place where he had awoken several times with a weird looking rock-man looking after him. It was empty now, with no trolls in sight. There were a few scattered boulders laying around with spots of moss on the top, and Nathan wondered if the trolls used them for something.

Elsa pulled her horse to a stop and motioned for the rest of the group to stop. Anna pulled on the reins and the horse they were on slowed to a stop. Anna pulled herself out of the saddle and jumped down to the ground. Nathan was about to follow her when he remembered the last time he had tried to dismount a horse. Unfortunately for him, Anna didn't seem to recall the event, and started walking towards the center of the clearing.

He called out to her "Anna!" and she turned. He nodded his head in the direction of the horse and mouthed the word "help". Anna seemed to get the message. She walked quickly back to the horse and helped Nathan down. He could feel his cheeks and ears burning slightly, but insisted even to himself that it was on account of the cold.

His boots hit the ground, and he felt instantly better. His being on solid ground again was a great comfort to him, as he had never been very comfortable riding horses. It probably had something to do with the several times he had been bucked from one as a child, but there was nothing to be done about that now.

He thanked Anna and looked around him. Eugene and Rapunzel were just dismounting their horse, and Anna was walking towards Elsa, who was standing in the middle of the clearing talking to the rocks.

Eugene walked up next to Nathan and stared at Elsa. "So" he said, confused "is this how you "Summon the trolls"?" he put air quotes around "summon the trolls" and then folded his arms.

Nathan was also staring at Elsa with a confused expression. "I don't know, I've never been awake for It." he said, shrugging.

Eugene nodded and turned to Rapunzel and said "Do you think this is how they call the trolls?" in a joking voice. Rapunzel looked like she was about to respond, when a shocked expression came across her face and her jaw dropped. Eugene and Nathan looked in the direction that she was looking and saw what had gotten such a reaction.

Almost all the stones in the valley were rolling towards Elsa and Anna. Nathan felt like he should do something, but the fact that they were motioning for the rocks to continue their path made him think that this was what they wanted to happen. As the rocks neared them they seemed to spring up and unroll. As the rocks unrolled they formed into the small stunted figures of the trolls that Nathan remembered seeing.

He walked slowly towards the group of stone people, placing his steps slowly and carefully, trying to make his approach quiet. He could hear Elsa talking to one of the trolls, saying "Please, we need to see Pabbie." One of the trolls said something that he couldn't hear, and Elsa responded "Yes, it is my friend again." A troll closer to Nathan said something that he could make out. "Why does he need so much help?" Another troll on the other side of Elsa shouted out "Maybe he should be more careful!"

Nathan gritted his teeth and muttered under his breath "Maybe you're the one that should be more careful." In an annoyed manner. It wasn't his fault that people kept blasting him with magic, if anything it was…

He took a deep breath and calmed himself. They didn't know the details, he reminded himself. He cursed himself again for getting angry, and became painfully aware of the fog still settled around his mind. If it was gone he wouldn't have gotten mad. He was sure. He couldn't wait until he recovered completely, he had had more than enough of his mind not being entirely his own.

The next thing he noticed was that all of the trolls surrounding Elsa were looking at him. It occurred to him that trolls might have superior hearing to humans, and if they did than they may have heard his threat. The looks on their faces said that they had heard him, with portion of them looking scared and another portion looking angry.

To his relief the crowd of trolls on the other side of Elsa parted and a large boulder rolled in past the trolls. It stopped in front of Elsa and sprang open, revealing the troll Nathan remembered as Pabbie. Elsa looked down at him with a smile and knelt down, talking to him.

Nathan walked forward and the crowd of trolls parted before him. A few of them still looked either scared or angered, but most of them seemed to have forgotten his little slip-up. As he approached Elsa continued talking with Pabbie. She said something to him and his eyes squinted at Nathan and a critical expression came over him.

As he drew up to Elsa and stopped walking the troll stepped forwards and said "So, back again I see." with a little smile. Nathan nodded and the troll motioned for him to kneel down. He did, and the troll looked into his eyes. "Hmm…" he said, turning Nathan's head left and right. Nathan kept his eyes focused on the troll the entire time. "Strange… strange." Pabbie muttered. He looked up past Nathan and called "Are you the one who did this?"

Nathan heard Eugene's voice come out from somewhere behind him "Nope, not me. It was her." Nathan could just imagine Eugene taking a step away from Rapunzel and pointing at her. Pabbie beckoned towards himself with the hand not still holding Nathan's face and said "Come here, girl." Nathan heard Rapunzel's light footsteps come up behind him. The troll let go of Nathan's face and motioned for Rapunzel to kneel down like Nathan had been. Nathan stood up and let Rapunzel take his place.

Pabbie looked deep into her eyes like he had with Nathan, then said "Where do you draw your magic from, girl?" he let go of her face but she stayed kneeling down. She hesitated than said "It's the power of the sun, if that's…" Pabbie shook his head and said "No, no, where did you get the power? You were not born with it, not naturally."

Rapunzel thought for a moment, then said "Oh! My father used a magic flower to heal my mother while she was pregnant with me. I got my power from the flower."

Pabbie nodded and said "Yes, some of the power of the sun flows through you. The sun brings life-" he said, looking up at the sun in the sky "-but too much of it can burn you." he said.

Nathan stepped forward and said "But it didn't burn me, not physically, at least." It was true, the water hadn't literally burned him, but it had certainly felt like it had. He remembered the feeling that his stomach had given him, like it was just rejecting the water as if it was rotten food.

Pabbie looked Nathan up and down, then said "Can you really expect to mix the magic of the sun with your magic of shadow, and expect no variance on the effect?"

Rapunzel and Elsa along with a few trolls around them all nodded like it made sense. Nathan thought for a moment before saying "But shouldn't shadow and sun magic be more compatible than anything?" Pabbie gave him a puzzled look and he continued "Without the sun, there would be no shadows, yea? And I'm not made of shadows, so why would her magic hurt me like that? I would understand if I took a hit to my energy, but I didn't."

Pabbie nodded and said "That is something I had not considered." He smiled at Nathan "You are a clever one. That's a good head on your shoulders." He shrugged "Even if it is a bit worse for wear." He turned away from them and started stroking his chin. "it may be that your body rejected the magic simply because it was unfamiliar to you. Did it heal you?" he turned back to Nathan and looked up at him. Nathan was about to respond when Pabbie seemed to see something in his face. "No, you are still concussed."

Rapunzel spoke, saying "Will there be any effect of the magic still in him?" Pabbie looked Nathan over and said "No, perhaps he will be more sensitive to light, but other than that, no."

Elsa took a step forward and asked "What about my magic, will there be any effects of that?"

Pabbie heaved a deep sigh and said "That is a much more difficult question to answer. He was blasted with far greater amounts of your magic than Rapunzel's, and that makes it very difficult to tell what any effect would be. None of your magic seems to have dissipated as I thought it would."

Nathan spoke up now, saying "Is there any way I could use Elsa's magic that's still inside me?" Pabbie tilted his head from one side to the other as if weighing the question. Finally he said "Perhaps, but it would be difficult." He looked up at Nathan "And you would not benefit from the same wealth of power she has."

Nathan nodded. It had been a long shot that he would be able to use her immense raw energy anyways. And even if he did start using her kind of magic he would have to construct individual spells, not just use it freeform the way she did.

Pabbie spread his small arms and said "Is that all, or are there other concerns that you wished to address?"

Elsa and Rapunzel shook their heads, but Nathan said "Yes, I've got one." He turned to face the others confused expressions and said "Just go get ready, this shouldn't take long." The girls gave him a worried look and Nathan waved a hand towards the horses and said "Just go get ready. It's fine." They hesitantly did as he said and he turned back to Pabbie.

He knelt down again and dug around in a pocket for a moment. After a pause, he produced the bone charm that he had tested with Elsa. "This" he said, holding it up for Pabbie to see "is the only bone charm like this I have ever seen. I want you to tell me how it got this way."

Pabbie took the charm in his hand and turned it over a few times. He put it to his ear, than a startled expression came over his face and he let it drop to the ground. He stumbled awkwardly away from the thing on the ground with his eyes fixed on it. Nathan scooped the charm up off the ground and said "You alright?"

Pabbie stopped moving back and cleared his throat. "I'm sorry, I just…" he looked from the charm to Nathan and narrowed his eyes. "Where did you get this?" he said suspiciously.

Nathan said "I guess I made it by accident." Pabbie gave him a distrusting and also curious glare. He decided to go on with his explanation. "Did Elsa tell you about the advisor who turned into a gas guy?" Pabbie nodded and Nathan continued. "I went through the guy's skin, and found a little… magic pearl thing. It had a light inside it. I couldn't figure out what it was, so after a while I got frustrated and tossed it across my room. It hit a bone charm, and this" he held the charm up "was what I picked up."

Pabbie nodded, the distrust and suspicion in his eyes gone. He groaned slightly and said "The charm has been… changed by a powerful magic. Something with immense power has forced the charm to change. Was there any power left in the pearl?"

Nathan thought, then said "No, I don't think so. None that I could tell."

Pabbie nodded and said "Good, the magic in the pearl must have been very powerful, and very foul. Dispose of the pearl as soon as possible! Its power will only serve its master. The fact it changed your charm does not mean that it is safe, you must destroy it!"

Nathan looked down at the charm in his hand. Destroy the pearl? It was the only lead on Gothel, there could be some way to track her with it, he couldn't just destroy it. He closed his hand around the charm. "And what should I do with this?"

Pabbie shrugged unsurely and said "It is powerful. Much more so than most others you may have found. It emanates an aura of fear, and will bend shadows around you." He smiled up at Nathan "Perhaps you will have a greater use for it than most, eh?"

Nathan returned his smile and stood. He turned to find Elsa, Eugene, Anna and Rapunzel all waiting for him, already on their horses. He jogged over to Anna's horse and clamored up into the saddle behind her. Elsa turned in her saddle and shouted "Ready?" to everyone. They all nodded, and Elsa set off leading the group back.

Nathan found the ride back to the castle much more pleasant that the ride away had been. His stomach wasn't nearly as upset as it had been the first time around, and his head didn't ache so much from the stamping of hooves.

He thought about what Pabbie had said. Destroy the pearl? Why? He had acted like the thing was dangerous, but it hadn't done a thing except for change a charm. He almost hoped that the thing would recharge somehow. He wanted to see if he could figure out how it worked.

The scenery wasn't much different this time around. They followed the same path they had come by, and Nathan found himself recognizing the odd tree or rock as they sped past. The white blanket of snow made all but the most distinctive features subdued and hidden, and he could only wonder at how many times Elsa must have run this path so become so familiar with it.

The rest of the trip passed fairly quickly. Before Nathan knew it the large wall of Arendelle was in view. They slowed before they went through so the guards stationed there could confirm their identities, than trotted slowly through the town.

Not many people seemed to be out, likely on account of the cold, but those who were shouted both friendly and reverend salutations to Anna and Elsa, who responded in kind. A small group of people approached and swarmed around Elsa's horse asking questions and shouting praise to her. Nathan was just starting to lift himself from the saddle to get down and tell them to go away when Elsa waved him off. He shrugged and sat back down. If she wanted to get mobbed by people, that was her choice.

As he watched her, shaking hands and exchanging words with the small crowd, it occurred to him that these were her people. These were the people who built up her kingdom and the people who she was responsible for. He smiled to himself and whispered "I'd almost forgotten she was the leader of a kingdom" to himself.

Elsa's interaction with the crowd didn't last long. A short span of time later Elsa bid farewell to the people that were gathered around her and set off again towards the castle. The gates to the outer wall slid open as they trotted down the bridge. The group entered in the courtyard and dismounted their horses, Nathan receiving assistance, much to his annoyance.

The group moved inside the castle, glad to be back in the warmth. Anna suggested that they spend the time until lunch in the library, and there was a round of agreements by everyone. The group made their way to the library slowly, laughing and talking along the way. Nathan trailed behind the others, his arms folded, deep in thought.

The large doors to the library opened, and the dusty smell of old books filled their noses. The group stepped in and each individual member found their own little niche in the library, curled up with a book.

A few hours passed like this, until a servant opened the door and leaned in, waved to get Elsa's attention, then made a gesture with his hands. Elsa smiled at him than stood, announcing to the room "Lunch is on!"

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Aouthurs Thing:

Thanks for reading, as always!  
I feel like i should be formatting these diffrently somehow. Any suggestions?


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